IvI  HRAK  V 

OF  THK 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 


OK 


Deceived 
Accessions 


ON  THE  USE  OF  SILVER 


AS  MONEY 


IN  THE   UNITED   STATES 


A   DISSERTATION    PRESENTED   TO   THE   BOARD  OF   UNIVERSITY    STUDIES 

OF  THE   JOHNS   HOPKINS   UNIVERSITY   FOR   THE 

DEGREE    OF   DOCTOR    OF   PHILOSOPHY 


ARTHUR  BURNHAM  WOODFORD 


>r  of  Economics  and  Politics,  School  of  Social  Economics,  New  York 


BALTIMORE,   1893 


PUBLICATIONS  OF 

THE  AMERICAN    ACADEMY  OF  POLITICAL,  AND  SOCIAL   SCIENCE. 

No.  96. 


ON  THE  USE  OF  SILVER 

AS  MONEY 
IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


AN  HISTORICAL  STUDY 


BY 


ARTHUR  BURNHAM  WOODFORD,  PH.  D., 

ii 

Professor  of  Economics  and  Politics  in  the  School 
of  Social  Econemtcsf-New  York  City. 


Sf  ,  O**        ,-*  V 

A  PAPER  SUBMITTED  TO  THE 
AMERICAN  ACADEMY  OF  POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL  SCIENCE. 


PHILADELPHIA : 

AMERICAN  ACADEMY  OF  POLITICAL  AND  SOCIAL  SCIENCE. 
1893. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE. 

Introduction I 

Early  History  of  the  Mint  (1792-1833)        ....  3 

The  Gold  Coin  Bill  of  1834 17 

Fractional  Silver  Coins  (1853) 26 

Reorganization  of  the  Mint  (1873) 31 

APPENDIX. 

Statement  A. — List  of  American  Coins      ....  44 

Statement  B. — Changes  in  Gold  and  Silver  Coin   .       .  45 

Statement  C. — Coinage  by  Periods  since  1792       .       .  45 

Table  I. — Gold  Coinage  by  Years 46 

Table  II. — Silver  Coinage  by  Years 49 

Diagram  I. — Gold  and  Silver  Coinage  since  1834          .  52 
Diagram  II. — Production   of    Gold   and   Silver   in   the 

United  States  since  1853 53 

Table  III. — Imports  and  Exports  of  Silver  since  1843     .  54 

Table  IV. — Imports  and  Exports  of  Gold  since  1843       •  5^ 
Table  V.— World's    Production    of    Gold   and    Silver 

(1492-1880) 58 

Diagram  III. — Annual  Production  (1873-1891)          .       .  59 
Diagram  IV.— Ratio  of  Silver  to  Gold  (1687-1891)  . 

Diagram  V. —  Value  of  Ounce  of  Silver  (1833-1892)     .  60 


TOT 

tflriTlBHTY 


USE   OF   SILVER   AS    MONEY    IN    THE 
UNITED   STATES. 


INTRODUCTION. 

The  history  of  monetary  experiences  cannot  be  too  often 
considered.  This  consideration  is  particularly  applicable  at 
the  present  time  to  silver  in  its  relation  to  American  coin 
currency.  Until  quite  recently  silver  has  been  but  little 
used  by  the  people  of  the  United  States  as  money.  Indeed, 
it  is  still  practically  true  that  it  is  only  used  for  change,  as 
no  large  bills  are  issued  on  the  silver  reserve.  Under  exist- 
ing law,  however,  the  government  is  obliged  to  purchase  an 
amount  of  silver  nearly,  if  not  quite,  equal  to  the  product 
of  American  mines.  A  new  experiment  is  thus  being  tried, 
the  result  of  which  it  is  exceedingly  difficult  to  predict  with 
definiteness.  An  historical  study  is  therefore  timely. 

The  silver  question,  moreover,  is  "in  politics."  It  has 
even  come  to  occupy  a  most  prominent  position,  and  there  has 
been  developed  not  only  a  keen  public  interest  in  the  philos- 
ophy of  the  bimetallic  controversy,  of  which  the  silver 
question  in  the  United  States  is  but  a  phase,  but  a  strong 
desire  for  accurate  knowledge  regarding  the  history  of  our 
currency. 

The  free  coinage  party  are  practically  urging  still  another 
experiment.  In  considering  it  and  the  future  currency 
policy  of  the  country,  and  of  the  world,  too  frequent  refer- 
ence cannot  be  made  to  the  results  of  the  several  experiments 
in  currency  legislation  which  former  Congresses  have  under- 
taken. History  may  afford  some  light  to  guide  us  in 
selecting  or  in  avoiding  certain  courses  of  action. 

The  subject  has  been  treated  by  many  writers  in  recent 

(i) 


2  ANNAI^S  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

times,  either  in  special  treatises,*  or  in  the  systematic 
text-books  on  political  economy,  particularly  those  by 
Andrews,  Ely,  and  Walker.  Three  international  confer- 
ences have  been  held  in  the  vain  hope  of  securing  concerted 
action  by  the  principal  commercial  nations.  The  question 
has  been  made  the  subject  of  investigation  by  Congressional 
and  by  Royal  Commission.  Yet,  in  spite  of  books  and 
reports,  of  investigations,  prize  contests,  and  the  rest, 
widespread  ignorance  remains  regarding  the  prominent  and 
fundamentally  important  facts  in  the  history  of  the  use  made 
of  silver  as  money  by  the  people  of  the  United  States  ;  the 
laws  which  have  been  passed ;  the  conditions  which  gave 
rise  to  these  statutes ;  and  the  effect  of  the  various  enact- 
ments on  the  circulation  of  coin  throughout  the  community. 
Materials  for  original  study  are  to  be  found  in  the  statutes 
themselves  and  in  the  reports  of  the  Congressional  debates 
-connected  with  their  enactment,  in  reports  to  Congress,  in 
petitions,  and  in  current  financial  literature.  The  reports 
of  the  Silver  Commission  of  1876  and  of  the  International 
Monetary  Conferences  of  1867,  1878,  and  1881  are  replete 
alike  with  information  and  with  argument  concerning  the 
relative  merits  of  gold  and  silver  for  use  either  separately  or 
conjointly  as  money.  Abstract  discussion  of  the  advantages 
or  the  dangers  of  ' '  bimetallism  ' '  is  not  attempted  here  :  it 
is  the  aim  of  the  writer  to  show  the  actual  use  made  of  silver 
as  money  during  the  century,  by  the  people  of  the  United 
States,  and  to  explain  the  reasons  for  that  use,  in  the  hope 
of  correcting  false  ideas  and  disseminating  a  knowledge  of  the 
necessary  conditions  of  bimetallism. 

*  Sumner,  "History  of  American  Currency"  (1874);  Cernuschi,  "  Nomisma,  or 
lyegal  Tender  "  (1877);  I,inderman,  "  Money  and  I,egal  Tender  in  the  United  States" 
(1877)  Weston,  "The  Silver  Question  "  (1878);  Walker,  "Money"  (1878),  and  "Money, 
Trade  and  Industry"  (1879)  ;  Bolles,  "Financial  History  of  the  United  States,"  3 
vols.  (1879-1886) ;  Knox,  "  United  States  Notes"  (1884)  (third  edition  1888) ;  Upton, 
"Money  in  Politics"  (1884);  I^aughlin,  "History  of  Bimetallism  in  the  United 
States  "  (1886)  ;  Nicholson,  "Money  and  Monetary  Problems"  (1888);  S.  Dana  Hor- 
ton,  "Silver  in  Europe"  (1890);  Boissevain,  " The  Monetary  Question"  (1891); 
Cowperthwait,  "  Money,  Silver  and  Finance"  (1892);  Ehrich,  "  The  Silver  Question" 
(1892);  Taussig,  "The  Silver  Situation  in  the  United  States"  (1892). 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  3 

EARLY    HISTORY   OF  THE   MINT. 

In  1783  Robert  Morris  presented  to  the  ''United  States, 
in  Congress  Assembled, ' '  a  specimen  American  coin.  Our 
national  coinage  may  be  said  to  date  from  the  making  of 
this  coin. 

For  several  years  the  matter  had  been  under  discussion 
and  had  been  made  the  subject  of  special  reports  ;  but  Con- 
gress repeatedly  postponed  definite  action.  The  report  of  a 
special  committee  created  in  1784,  of  which  Jefferson  was  a 
member,  outlined  a  plan,  based  on  the  report  of  the  Super- 
intendent of  Finance.  On  July  6,  1785,  and  August  8, 
1786,  more  definite  regulations  were  made  in  anticipation  of 
the  creation  of  a  national  currency,  and  finally,  on  October 
1 6,  1786,  there  was  enacted  '  *  An  Ordinance  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  Mint  of  the  United  States  of  America  and 
for  regulating  the  value  and  alloy  of  coin,"  and  provision 
was  made  for  the  employment  of  proper  officers  and  workmen 
in  the  Mint.  This  plan,  however,  was  never  carried  into 
execution,  as  matters  of  greater  importance  occupied  the 
government  and  the  people  of  the  United  States.  It  was  not 
until  after  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution  that  the  Mint  was 
established,  and  it  was  practically  a  generation  and  a  half 
before  a  national  coin  currency  came  into  general  use. 

In  the  practical  administration  of  affairs  it  is  often  an  im- 
perative necessity  that,  with  or  without  the  aid  of  legislation, 
the  kind  of  money  to  be  received  by  the  government  in  pay- 
ment of  taxes,  dues,  etc. ,  shall  be  determined.  When  income 
does  not  equal  expenditure,  it  becomes  necessary  for  a  gov- 
ernment to  borrow  money.  During  the  Revolutionary  War 
the  Congress  of  the  United  States  had  authorized  the  execu- 
tive officers  to  borrow  dollars.  But  what  is  a  "dollar?" 
No  one  is  disposed  to  ask  this  question  when  the  currents  of 
industry,  trade  and  commerce  are  flowing  smoothly.  It  is 
only  in  periods  of  sudden  change  and  uncertain  credit,  or  of 
legislative  interference  with  the  representative  of  the  money 
of  account,  that  doubt  arises.  In  the  years  following  the 


4  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

adoption  of  the  Constitution  the  matter  became  one  of  serious 
difficulty,  requiring  for  its  resolution  the  careful  and  disinter- 
ested consideration  of  the  statesmen  of  the  period. 

In  a  certain  sense  it  is  entirely  in  the  power  of  Congress 
to  determine  what  shall  be  considered  a  dollar — what  shall 
be  the  monetary  unit  of  the  country.  Every  industrially 
developed  community  must  have  a  money  of  account.  It  is 
at  once  the  evidence  and  the  basis  of  commercial  progress. 
It  is  the  condition  of  trade  on  a  large  scale.  But  the  political 
power  in  the  State,  the  statutory  law,  determines  what  shall 
be  the  material  representative  and  coin  equivalent  of  the  unit 
of  account,  as  well  as  what  shall  be  legal  tender  in  payment 
promises  of  to  pay  money  and  in  settlement  of  obligations.  By 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  (Article  I.,  Section  10) 
the  States  are  forbidden  to  ' '  coin  money  ;  emit  bills  of  credit ; 
make  anything  but  gold  and  silver  coin  a  tender  in  payment 
of  debts."  And  by  Article  I.,  Sections,  clauses,  Congress  is 
given  power  "  to  coin  money,  regulate  the  value  thereof, 
and  of  foreign  coin,  and  fix  the  standard  of  weights  and 
measures. ' '  This  power  Congress  has  repeatedly  exercised. 

When,  under  the  Articles  of  the  Confederation,  Con- 
gress instructed  the  Superintendent  of  Finance  to  report 
a  table  of  rates  at  which  the  different  species  of  foreign 
coins,  most  likely  to  circulate  within  the  United  States, 
should  be  received  at  the  Treasury,  Morris  insisted,  by 
way  of  reply,  that  "In  the  present  moment  [1782]  it  is 
by  no  means  of  such  consequence  to  establish  the  relative 
value  of  different  coins,  as  to  provide  a  standard  of  our  own 
by  which  in  future  to  estimate  them."  His  report*  was 
devoted  to  an  exposition  of  the  dangers  and  disadvantages 
threatening  the  existing  currency  and  to  the  presentation  of 
a  plan  for  improving  it.  He  argued  that  a  uniform  currency 
was  necessary  to  industrial  security  and  development.  Coins 
of  every  description — Spanish  and  English  coins,  coins  of 
France  and  coins  of  Portugal — coins  of  various  values  and 

*  Diplomatic  Correspondence,  Vol.  XII. ,    p.  81 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  5 

of  varying  value — all  were  current  in  different  parts  of  the 
country.  The  pound  was  the  money  of  account,  but  most 
diverse  ideas  prevailed  regarding  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence. 
The  want  of  small  coin  for  the  common  occasions  of  trade  ; 
the  need  of  a  legal  tender  to  protect  both  the  honest  debtor 
and  the  honest  creditor  ;  the  disappearance  of  the  depreciated 
medium,  the  Continental  currency,  with  its  infinite  incon- 
venience and  danger  ; — all  argued  the  wisdom  of  adopting  an 
American  coinage  system  and  of  establishing  a  government 
mint.  The  time  appeared  opportune.  There  was  a  suffi- 
cient supply  of  specie  in  the  country  :  it  needed  only  to  be 
recoined  into  American  coins,  and  this  could  be  done  in  a 
very  short  time.  Above  all,  the  public  credit,  which  was 
almost  completely  broken,  would  be  greatly  strengthened. 
In  the  mind  of  the  Superintendent,  or  of  his  Assistant, 
Gouverneur  Morris,  who  is  probably  the  author  of  the  report, 
in  the  main,  the  opportunity  imposed  the  duty.  Still,  for  a 
decade,  Congress  took  no  action. 

The  conclusive  argument,  the  compelling  cause,  which 
finally  brought  partial  order  out  of  monetary  chaos,  was 
indicated  by  Hamilton  in  his  report  on  the  ' '  Establishment 
of  a  Mint,"  January  28,  1791.  ''The  dollar  originally  con- 
templated in  the  money  transactions  of  this  country, ' '  says  the 
report,  ' '  by  successive  diminutions  of  its  weight  and  fineness, 
has  sustained  a  depreciation  of  five  per  cent.  .  .  .  The 
value  of  property  .  .  .  fluctuates  with  the  fluctuations 
of  a  foreign  mint. ' '  Manifestly  there  was  neither  security, 
convenience,  nor  economy  in  dependence  upon  a  foreign 
mint.  Depreciation  and  debasement  of  our  money  by  acts 
of  a  distant  sovereign  were  not  to  be  tolerated.  The  Second 
Congress,  by  the  Act  of  1792,  attempted  to  provide  the 
means  for  securing  a  uniform,  convenient,  and  intelligible 
system  of  national  coins. 

Perhaps  the  most  important  feature  of  the  act  establishing 
the  mint  was  the  provision  authorizing  the  free  coinage  of  both 
gold  and  silver.  Both  metals  were  to  be  coined  gratuitously 


6  ANNAI^S  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

for  all  comers,  in  the  order  of  arrival.  The  legal  step 
tending  toward  bimetallism  was  taken  in  this  first  act  regula- 
ting the  currency.  The  silver  dollar  or  unit  was  *  *  to  be  of 
the  value  of  a  Spanish  milled  dollar  ' '  as  the  same  was  then 
current,  "and  to  contain,"  continues  the  statute,  "three 
hundred  and  seventy-one  grains  and  four-sixteenths  parts  of  a 
grain  of  pure,  or  four  hundred  and  sixteen  grains  of  standard 
silver."*  This  unit  for  silver  coins  was  not  that  proposed 
by  Morris — one-quarter  of  a  grain  of  pure  silver,  with  1440 
to  the  dollar — which  Jefferson  had  characterized  as  too 
minute  for  ordinary  use  and  too  laborious  for  computation. 
It  was  not  the  unit  urged  by  Jefferson  himself,  who  desired 
a  single  unit  both  for  weight  and  for  money.  It  was  not 
entirely  the  dollar  suggested  by  Hamilton.  The  pure  metal 
contained,  371^  grains,  was  in  accordance  with  his  proposi- 
tion, and  it  is  interesting,  though  perhaps  not  important,  to 
note  that  no  change  has  since  been  made  in  the  weight  of 
pure  metal  in  silver  dollars  except  for  the  small  number 
of  trade-dollars  coined  in  the  seventies.  The  gross  weight, 
416  grains,  was  that  of  an  average  lot  of  Spanish  coins 
bearing  the  date  1761,  but  then  no  longer  current. 

The  principles  and  proposals  of  Hamilton  concerning  gold 
coins  were  adopted  entire.  The  gold  coins  were  spoken 
of  as  units  or  dollars.  ' '  A  preference, ' '  he  says,  '  *  ought 
to  be  given  to  neither  of  the  metals,  gold  or  silver."  He 
was  of  the  opinion  that  the  money  unit  had  virtually  been 
gold  rather  than  silver,  silver  dollars  having  circulated  by 
tale  as  a  mere  money 'of  convenience,  without  much  regard 
to  either  weight  or  fineness  ;  but  he  presented  what  seemed 
to  him  strong  reasons  for  endeavoring  to  make  permanent 
the  concurrent  circulation  of  both  kinds  of  money.  Both 
alike  were  required  for  home  and  for  foreign  trade. 

*  This  most  peculiar  proportion  was  not  actually  adopted  by  the  mint  authorities 
until  1796,  after  Congress  had  repeatedly  refused  to  modify  it,  and  the  Director  of 
the  Mint  was  unwilling  longer  to  disobey  the  statute.  Why  this  inconvenient 
standard,  i-M5,  was  first  adopted  and  then  forced  on  the  mint,  it  now  seems 
impossible  to  determine. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  7 

"If  gold  be  most  convenient,"  he  said,  "in  large  payments,  silver 
is  best  adapted  to  the  more  minute  and  ordinary  circulation.  .  .  . 
To  annul  the  use  of  either  of  the  metals  as  money  is  to  abridge  the 
quantity  of  circulating  medium,  and  is  liable  to  all  the  objections 
which  arise  from  a  comparison  of  the  benefits  of  a  full,  with  the  evils 
of  a  scanty,  circulation." 

Hamilton  was  a  practical  bimetallist.  He  aimed  to  secure 
the  concurrent  circulation  of  the  two  metals  for  commercial 
convenience.  To-day  '  *  free  coinage  ' '  is  demanded  on  the 
score  of  justice  as  between  debtor  and  creditor.  The  con- 
current circulation  of  the  two  kinds  of  coins  proposed  is  at 
least  a  matter  of  doubt ;  it  might  or  it  might  not  result,  by 
raising  the  price  of  silver  to  $1.29  per  ounce,  as  is 
predicted. 

Bimetallism  is  to  be  defined  either  as  a  state  of  the  law  or 
a  state  of  the  currency.  If  the  latter  is  accepted  as  the  most 
satisfactory  definition  of  the  term,  the  state  of  the  law  must 
be  regarded  as  merely  the  means  •  to  the  end,  and  practical 
bimetallists — those  who  seek  the  end — may  and  will  differ  as 
to  the  law  which  will  prove  most  efficacious  under  any  exist- 
ing circumstances.  Mr.  Bland  asserts,  and  some,  perhaps  all, 
of  the  men  who  act  with  him  honestly  believe,  that  concurrent 
circulation  would  result  from  a  law  allowing  the  free  coinage 
of  both  metals  at  the  old  ratio  of  16  to  i.  Hamilton,  a 
century  since,  in  considering  the  state  of  the  currency, 
believed  that  the  two  kinds  of  coins  would  circulate  only  if 
made  at  the  ratio  of  1 5  to  i .  He  fully  appreciated  the  diffi- 
culties of  successfully  carrying  out  the  policy  of  bimetallism, 
and  the  necessary  consequence  which  would  follow  any  con- 
siderable underrating  of  either  metal — "  banishment  of  that 
which  is  undervalued ;  .  .  .  diminution  of  the  total 
quantity  of  specie  which  a  country  would  naturally  possess ; 
.  .  .  greater  and  more  frequent  disturbance  of  the  state 
of  the  money  unit. ' '  He  therefore  urged  that  care  be  taken 
to  regulate  the  proportion  of  pure  metal  in  the  two  varieties 
of  coin,  "  with  an  eye  to  their  average  commercial  value." 


8  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

Hamilton,  placing  this  market  ratio  at  very  near  15  to  i, 
and  believing  that  this  ratio  would  be  permanent,  proposed 
(i)  gold  coins,  with  24^  grains,  and  (2)  silver  coins, 
with  371^  grains  of  pure  metal  to  the  dollar, — 

"  The  alloy  in  each  case  to  be  one-twelfth  of  the  total  weight,  which 
will  make  the  unit  27  grains  of  standard  gold,  and  405  grains  of  stand- 
ard silver.  The  former,"  he  continues,  "is  exactly  agreeable  to  the 
present  value  of  gold,  and  the  latter  is  within  a  small  fraction  of  the 
mean  of  the  two  last  emissions  of  [Spanish]  dollars — the  only  ones 
which  are  now  found  in  common  circulation." 

The  questions  before  Congress,  as  enumerated  by  Hamil- 
ton in  this  report,  were  the  following  : 

1 .  As  to  the  nature  of  the  money  unit 

2.  As  to  the  proportion  between  gold  and  silver,  if  coins 
of  both  metals  were  to  be  established 

3.  The  amount  and  composition  of  the  alloy 

4.  The  amount  of  seigniorage 

5.  The  number,  denomination,  sizes   and  devices  of  the 
coins 

6.  The  currency  of  foreign  coins. 

The  answer  which  Hamilton  gave  to  the  first  and  second 
of  these  questions  was  simply,  That  the  law  should  recognize 
and  endeavor  to  make  permanent  the  conditions  of  the  cur- 
rency existing  at  the  time  so  far  as  the  unit  and  the  concur- 
rent circulation  of  both  gold  and  silver  coins  were  concerned, 
and  should  establish  and  preserve  a  standard  dollar  by  the 
substitution  of  national  coins  for  a  miscellaneous  lot  of  semi- 
international  coins  with  constantly  changing  values. 

These  principles  were  practically  those  presented  by  Jef- 
ferson in  his  letter  of  1784.  In  the  time  intervening  after 
that  report  was  written  Jefferson  had  studied  with  care  the 
practical  features  of  the  art  of  coining  as  practiced  in  Kurope, 
and  had  acquainted  himself  with  workers  in  metal  and  the 
possibilities  of  securing  officials  for  the  Mint.  When  the 
Mint  was  established,  in  1792,  it  was  placed  under  his 
charge  in  the  Department  of  State.  We  may  conclude 


USE  OF  SII/VER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  9 

then  that,  while  the  outline  of  our  system  of  currency 
was  determined  by  the  conditions  of  colonial  trade,  its 
distinguishing  characteristics  may  be  ascribed  in  about  equal 
measure  to  the  influence  of  these  three  men — Morris,  Jefferson 
and  Hamilton. 

In  the  discussion  regarding  the  Mint  and  the  currency 
during  this  early  period  one  seeks  in  vain  for  any  evidence 
of  a  bimetallic  controversy  like  that  of  recent  times.  As  a 
state  of  the  currency  in  every  way  desirable  and  convenient, 
bimetallism  was  an  acknowledged  fact.  It  was  accepted  not 
only  as  practicable  but  necessary,  and  the  law  which  laid 
the  foundation  of  our  national  coinage  system  was  conceived 
for  the  purpose  of  providing  the  legal  conditions  necessary 
to  its  continuance.  It  had  been,  and  for  a  long  time  it 
continued  to  be,  an  open  question  whether  the  expenditure 
necessary  for  the  establishment  of  a  government  mint  would 
be  a  good  investment.  But  when  it  was  determined  to 
undertake  this  work  discussion  seems  to  have  become  limited 
to  the  purely  practical  considerations  of  convenience  in 
the  coins.  Indeed,  little  more  interest  was  manifested  in 
the  subject,  at  the  time,  than  during  the  days  of  the  Con- 
tinental Congress.  Though  the  bill  was  before  the  Senate 
several  times  between  December  21  and  January  9,  the  only 
reference  to  it  in  the  Annals  of  Congress  regards  the  em- 
ployment of  officers,  the  keeping  of  accounts,  and  the  emblems 
to  be  borne  by  the  coins.  The  latter  subject  occasioned 
an  interesting  and  an  amusing  discussion  in  the  House, 
and  even  resulted  in  a  difference  between  the  two  Houses. 
The  Senate  had  proposed  a  representation  of  the  head  of  the 
President  for  the  time  being,  with  his  name,  etc. ,  but  it  was 
objected  that  to  do  this  was  to  incur  the  danger  * '  of  imitating 
the  flattery  and  almost  idolatrous  practices  of  monarchies." 
Despite  the  popular  ridicule  of  the  idea  of  "the  people's 
being  enslaved  by  their  President,  and  much  less  by  his 
image  on  their  coin,"  the  House  of  Representatives,  by  a 
vote  of  24  to  32,  refused  to  recede  from  its  amendment  in 


io  ANNAI^S  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

favor  of  a  design  ' '  Emblematic  of  Liberty . ' '  The  Senate 
ultimately  accepted  the  amendment,  but  the  character  of  the 
emblem  was  left  entirely  to  the  discretion  of  the  administra- 
tion. 

April  2,  1792,  the  Act  was  approved  by  President 
Washington,  who  had  been  authorized  the  year  previous  to 
engage  artists  and  procure  apparatus,  and  the  work  of 
minting  began  at  once.  But  the  making  of  coin  was  a  new 
industry  in  this  country.  The  initial  difficulties  to  be 
overcome  were  many  and  great.  Workmen  were  to  be 
obtained,  and  the  plant,  and  the  raw  material  furnished  ; 
suitable  buildings,  furnaces,  delicate  machinery,  dies,  rollers, 
presses,  drawing  and  milling  machines  were  wanted ;  and 
both  materials  and  tools  were  lacking,  and  machinists  and 
skilled  workmen  were  not  easily  found.  Finally,  when  the 
Mint  was  ready  for  work,  there  was  little  work  to  be  done. 
Coin  and  bullion  were  sent  in  small  quantities  only,  and  the 
treasury  did  not  provide  means  for  the  purchase  of  bullion. 
The  expense  of  refining,  much  greater  then  than  now,  was 
at  first  borne  entirely  by  the  government.  Again  there 
were  no  laws  which  properly  protected  the  government  in 
the  monopoly  of  coinage.  In  the  report  for  1795,  the 
Director  of  the  Mint  states  that  mints  were  erected  at  Balti- 
more and  elsewhere,  professedly  to  imitate  the  coins  of 
foreign  countries  and  to  furnish  a  debased  gold  coin  for  the 
West  India  market.  How  much  minting  they  did  is  not 
stated. 

The  minor  and  technical  difficulties  relating  to  methods 
of  manufacture  and  management  were  gradually  overcome, 
partly  with,  partly  without,  the  aid  of  legislation.  But  the 
major  difficulty  remained :  neither  coin  nor  bullion  was 
offered  at  the  mint  with  any  regularity  or  in  sufficient  quan- 
tities* to  employ  the  mint  officials  or  to  affect  appreciably 
the  coin  currency  of  the  country.  This  lack  of  material 
was  at  once  a  cause  and  an  effect  of  the  difficulties 

*  See  American  State  Papers,  Finance,  I.,  pp.  476  and  504. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  n 

encountered.  Neither  gold  nor  silver  was  produced  in  the 
country  ;  no  private  interest  existed  anxious  to  avail  itself 
of  the  privilege  of  having  its  product  gratuitously  manu- 
factured by  the  government  ;v  neither  was  there  any  induce- 
ment for  individuals  to  offer  foreign  money  for  recoinage 
while  the  foreign  coins  were  convenient  and  were  full  legal 
tender. 

Worst  of  all,  the  treasury  entirely  failed  to  co-operate 
with  the  mint  in  the  effort  to  provide  a  system  of  national 
coins.  Even  after  inquiry  on  the  part  of  a  House  Com- 
mittee, the  secretaries  refused  compliance  with  a  very 
definite  provision  of  the  statute,  according  to  which  all  coin 
received  by  the  government  officials  in  the  treasury  depart- 
ment was  to  be  sent  to  the  mint  and  recoined  into  American 
money  before  being  allowed  to  pass  into  circulation  again. 
It  is  true  that  the  governmental  transactions  of  receipt  and 
in  many  instances  expenditure  of  moneys  took  place  at 
distant  points.  The  officials  in  charge  apparently  deemed  it 
unwise  to  entail  the  expense  of  transportation  in  both 
directions.  Even  the  money  received  in  Philadelphia  was 
not  sent  to  the  mint.  As  late  as  1803,  the  Director  of  the 
Mint  reports  that  no  precious  metal  had  been  coined  on 
account  of  the  Government  of  the  United  States. 

Hamilton  had  considered  three  years  an  ample  time  for 
the  conversion  of  the  coin  currency  of  the  country.  The 
average  annual  net  ' '  ordinary  ' '  receipts  of  the  government 
from  1796  to  1800  were  over  $8,000,000 — an  amount  cer- 
tainly equal  to  one-half  the  total  alnount  of  coin  in  the 
country  at  the  time.  That  the  conversion  of  the  coin  was 
possible  within  three  years  is  conclusively  shown  by  these 
figures  ;  still  the  average  annual  coinage  at  the  mint  for  the 
decade  1795-1805  was  only  $500,000.  If  the  treasury 
department,  which  had  recommended  it,  would  not  conform 
to  the  law  seeking  to  substitute  a  national  for  a  foreign  coin, 
it  was  not  to  be  expected  that  individuals  would  do  so,  or 
would  voluntarily  undertake  the  task. 


12  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

The  few  coins  that  were  made  were  soon  exported.  The 
cheaper  coins — those  invariably  chosen  when  preference  is 
offered — were  the  worn  and  depreciated  foreign  coins.  New 
American  coins  could  not  " drive  them  out."  English, 
French,  Spanish  and  Portuguese  coins  circulated  freely,  and 
from  time  to  time  certain  of  them  were  made  legal  tender, 
at  specified  rates,  by  tale  or  weight.  The  American  dollars 
and  eagles  were  exported,  because  worth  more  as  commodi- 
ties in  other  markets  than  as  a  circulating  medium  or  a 
means  of  paying  debts  in  the  United  States.  Gold  coins 
were  not  issued  until  the  latter  part  of  1795,  and  as  early  as 
1798  it  was  stated  in  Congress  that  a  large  quantity  had 
been  seen  in  a  goldsmith's  window  in  Kngland.  "Thus 
easily  do  our  eagles  take  their  flight."* 

In  the  first  years  of  the  century  the  drain  of  silver  dollars 
was  so  great  that  the  government  ceased  making  them  after 
March,  1804,  none  being  issued  thereafter  until  1836.  It  is 
worthy  of  note  that  this  policy  was  originally  adopted  by 
the  administration  as  a  means  of  preventing  the  exportation 
of  coins,  and  was  followed  by  the  mint  authorities  without 
any  specific  law  authorizing  them  to  refuse  to  coin  silver 
dollars. 

During  all  this  time  the  mint  occupied  a  precarious  posi- 
tion ;  even  its  continuance  became  a  matter  of  dispute.  By 
many  it  was  regarded  as  an  expensive  luxury,  a  needless 
burden,  which  ought  not  to  be  borne  longer.  It  was  urged 
that  it  cost  $1.00  to  coin  $10.00.  In  1802  a  bill  to  close  the 
mint  passed  the  House,  but  failed  in  the  Senate.  After 
extended  discussions,  the  acts  were  passed  providing  for  the 
continuance  of  the  mint  at  Philadelphia  for  a  period  of  from 
one  to  five  years.  It  was  not  until  1828  that  the  bill  passed 
Congress  providing  for  its  permanent  establishment.  In 
1782,  in  the  report  of  the  superintendent  of  finance,  it 
was  urged  that  the  coins  put  into  circulation  should  be  few 
and  simple,  in  order  that  they  might  *  *  become  familiar  to 

L_  *  "  Annals  of  Congress,"  5th  Cong.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  750. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  13 

all  ranks  and  degrees  of  men."  Nearly  two  generations 
passed  away  before  the  first  American  coins,  the  very  coins 
— of  gold — which  Morris  had  held  we  should  never  need, 
became  thus  familiar  to  the  people ;  and  the  third  genera- 
tion was  well  advanced  before  a  general  national  coin 
currency  was  secured  by  the  subsidiary  coinage  law  of  1853 
and  the  laws  of  1864,  1865  and  1866  authorizing  the  smaller 
token  coins. 

Bank-notes  were  more  successful  in  the  competition  with 
foreign  coins.  After  1800  the  bank  circulation  became  an 
important  factor  in  the  currency  of  the  country.  Prior  to 
that  time  the  currency  of  the  country  was  composed  almost 
entirely  of  gold  and  silver  money.  Subsequently  banks 
came  into  existence  in  rapid  succession.  The  Bank  of  the 
United  States  (1791-1811)  afforded  a  reasonably  satisfactory 
credit  currency;  but  its  dissolution  in  1811  occasioned  an 
enormous  increase  in  the  credit  currency  of  the  country. 
In  1815  the  domestic  paper  which  the  treasury  felt  obliged 
to  receive  was  of  every  degree  of  unsoundness.  Specie 
payments  had  been  generally  suspended  in  1814.  The 
latter  part  of  the  war  had  been  conducted  almost  entirely 
on  treasury  notes  instead  of  long  loans  and  bonds.  In  his 
report  of  December  6,  1815,  Dallas  stated  that  it  was  im- 
possible to  estimate  the  working  value  of  the  income  of  the 
government.  ' '  The  possession  of  funds  in  one  part  no 
longer  affords  evidence  of  a  fiscal  capacity  to  discharge  a 
public  debt  in  another  part  of  the  Union. ' '  The  differing 
values  of  the  foreign  coins  used  established  at  least  seven 
different  standards  of  value  in  the  current  money.  The 
situation  was  as  serious  as  in  the  days  before  the  adoption 
of  the  Constitution. 

The  period  from  1815  to  the  panic  of  1819  was  one 
marked  by  extreme  fluctuations,  prices  and  credits  changing 
with  war-time  rapidity.  There  were  no  uniform  and  con- 
venient instruments  of  credit ;  no  medium  existed  for  cir- 
culating obligations  and  facilitating  transfers  of  the 


14  ANNAI^  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

evidences  of  debt ;  no  money  of  constant  value  was 
circulated  throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  the  land ; 
there  was  no  secure  basis  for  any  portion  of  the  vast  amount 
of  credit  currency  ;  no  standard  or  ' '  common  denominator ' ' 
of  value.  All  things  were  measured  in  the  primitive  unit — 
a  day's  labor.  Net  imports  rose  and  fell  as  follows,  in 
millions  of  dollars:  1814,  12.8;  1815,  106.5;  1816,  130; 
1817,  79.9  ;  1818,  102.3  J  I8i9,  68.  The  net  ordinary  receipts 
of  the  government  were  15.7  million  dollars  in  1815,  47.7  in 
1816,  33  millions  in  1817,  21.6  in  1818,  and  $24,600,000  in 
1819.  Exchange  on  London,  which  had  fallen  to  twenty 
per  cent  discount  on  the  nominal  par  ($4.44$)  in  1812, 
was  twenty  per  cent  premium  in  1816.  The  depreciation 
of  the  paper  currency  was  an  important  element  in  the 
situation,  and  a  direct  cause  of  the  deranged  state  of  industry 
and  commerce. 

The  evil  effects  of  unsound  currency  and  the  necessity  for 
a  mint  and  a  national  system  of  coinage  were  felt  even  more 
strongly  after  the  panic  of  1819  and  the  resumption  of  specie 
payments  by  the  Bank  of  England  after  a  suspension  of 
twenty-six  years.  As  between  individuals,  it  is  contrast 
with  others  that  develops  economic  wants  among  nations. 
In  international  intercourse,  trade  and  competition,  it  makes 
but  little  difference  how  poor  the  currency  of  a  country  may 
be,  and  indeed  its  deficiencies  are  not  realized,  until  other 
nations  secure  a  money  of  a  higher  industrial  grade.  In 
1814  a  deranged  currency  and  the  suspension  of  specie  pay- 
ments operated  as  an  expelling  force.  In  1819  organization 
and  system  abroad,  the  resumption  of  specie  payment  in  the 
English  currency,  added  an  impulse  attracting  the  better 
part  of  our  currency  to  other  countries. 

As  a  means  of  relief  from  currency  difficulties  Congress 
chartered  the  (Second)  Bank  of  the  United  States  in  1816, 
with  right  to  establish  branches  and  with  privileges  of  issue, 
and  revived  for  three  years  an  act  making  certain  foreign 
coins  legal  tender.  Again  a  bank-note  circulation,  with 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  15 

foreign  coins  as  a  basis,  was  accepted  as  our  national  cur- 
rency. This  secured  neither  soundness  for  the  credit  currency 
of  large  transactions,  nor  convenient  fractional  money  for 
retail  trade. 

In  his  report  on  the  banks  and  the  currency  in  1820,  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  Crawford,  stated  that  small  notes 
circulated  in  a  majority  of  the  States  to  the  exclusion  of 
silver.  Small  change  was  not  abundant  anywhere  except  in 
Philadelphia,  the  seat  of  the  mint.  Tickets  of  6^ ,  io»,  1 2  j£ , 
25  and  50  cents,  issued  by  mayors  and  corporation  officers, 
and  dollar  bills  torn  in  two  pieces  for  the  purposes  of  change, 
were  everywhere  used.  * '  The  fractional  parts  of  a  dollar, ' ' 
he  said,  * '  are  so  indispensable  in  the  transactions  of  indi- 
viduals that  anything  which  assumes  that  character  will  be 
employed."* 

Two  other  plans  were  proposed  in  1816  and  1819  for 
securing  a  better  currency,  but  neither  was  adopted.  First 
it  was  proposed  to  prohibit  the  exportation  of  coin  ;  for  the 
new  coins  were  regularly  exported,  particularly  to  India. 
Both  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  and  the  Senate  Commit- 
tee reported  against  the  bill  proposing  the  old  remedy  of  a 
prohibition  on  the  exportation.  Such  a  law,  they  claimed, 
could  not  possibly  be  made  effectual  in  any  country,  least 
of  all  in  the  United  States ;  and  so  far  as  it  was  actually 
operative  it  would  be  in  favor  of  the  more  corrupt  and  dis- 
honest portion  of  the  business  community.  Congress  did 
not  commit  the  folly  of  enacting  this  law  :  the  testimony  of 
history  to  the  inefficiency  of  the  means  was  too  great. 
Neither  did  it  then  adopt  the  second  plan  proposed — that  of 
reducing  the  weight  of  the  monetary  un!t  and  thus  making  a 
given  amount  of  metal  in  the  shape  of  an  American  coin  worth 
more  in  domestic  trade  and  for  the  payment  of  debts  at  home 
than  for  export.  This  plan  had  been  strongly  urged  in 
1816,  and  was  favorably  reported  on  by  a  House  Committee 
in  1819.  In  the  latter  instance  it  was  recommended 

*  Report  of  February  12,  1820.    American  State  Papers,  Finance,  in.,  p.  494. 


1 6  ANNAIvS   OF   THE   AMERICAN    ACADEMY. 

that  a  charge  of  14.85  grains  be  made  for  seigniorage 
on  fractional  silver  coins,  their  legal  tender  quality  being 
limited  to  the  payment  of  debts  of  five  (5)  dollars  or  less,  and 
that  the  weight  of  the  gold  coins  be  reduced  about  four  per 
cent. 

By  this  time  gold  had  disappeared  entirely  from  circulation 
and  even  in  goodly  measure  from  the  vaults  of  the  banks. 
Their  reserve  was  largely  fractional  silver.  Foreign  coins 
circulated  in  seaport  towns  and  on  the  frontiers,  where  bank 
paper  was  not  received.  But  again,  the  only  action  taken 
by  Congress  in  1819,  was  to  extend  the  life  of  the  mint  for 
another  period  of  five  years,  and  to  continue  the  legal  tender 
quality  of  certain  foreign  coins — Spanish  coins  indefinitely 
and  French  silver  coins  for  four  years. 

The  amount  of  gold  and  silver  coins  issued  by  the  mint 
of  the  United  States  in  each  quinquennial  period,  from  1792 
to  1834,  is  as  follows,  in  millions  of  dollars  : 

Gold.        Silver. 

1794-5  to  1800 i.  1.4 

1801  "  1805 1.5  .5 

1806  "  1810 1.7  3.1 

1811  "  1815 1.4  2.6 

1816  "  1820 1.8  3.4 

1821  "  1825 .6  5.9 

1826  "  1830 1.3  ii. 

1831  "  1833 2.5  8.5 

This  period  has  been  called  the .  silver  period  by  the  his- 
torian of  bimetallism  in  the  United  States.*  It  is  much 
more  distinctively  the  period  of  bank  notes  and  of  foreign 
coins.  Indeed  it  can  hardly  be  said  to  have  been  a  period 
of  American  coinage.  In  describing  it,  Professor  McMaster 
says  :f 

"  The  coinage,  though  national  in  name,  was  not  national  in  value. 
The  old  stockings  of  the  people  were  full  of  coins  bearing  the  stamps 
of  many  foreign  mints,  called  by  all  manner  of  names,  and  possessing 
different  values  in  different  places.  .  .  .  They  had  been  in  circu- 
lation long  before  the  war  for  independence,  had  seen  much  service, 

*  Professor  J.  L,aurence  I,aughlin,  of  Chicago  University. 

+  "  History  of  the  People  of  the  United  States,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  189. 


USK  OF  SILVER   IN  THK  UNITED  STATES.  17 

and  were  none  the  better  for  the  wear  and  tear  they  had  sustained. 
The  four  pence  pieces  passed  for  six  and  a  quarter  cents  if  the  inscrip- 
tion was  legible,  but  only  for  five  if  smooth  and  '  crossed. '  The  nine 
pence  passed  for  twelve  and  a  half  cents.  The  pistareen  was  worth 
twenty  cents.  The  picayune  went  for  six  and  a  quarter  cents.  .  .  . 
Some  shilling  pieces  and  six  pence  pieces  were  to  be  found  in  circu- 
lation down  even  to  the  Civil  War,  and  were,  with  the  rips,  the  levies 
and  the  pistareens,  the  last  relics  of  a  time  happily  passed  away." 

THE   GOLD   COIN   BILL  OF    1834. 

The  first  important  change  in  the  laws  relating  to  our 
coinage  system  was  made  in  1834.  Its  purpose,  according 
to  the  advocates  of  the  measure,  was  to  resuscitate  the  gold 
currency.  The  administration  had  been  successful  in  its 
prolonged  contest  with  the  bank.  This  fact,  together  with 
the  increasing  importance  of  gold  mining  in  the  Southern 
States,  seems  to  have  been  the  direct  occasion  of  the  law 
and  to  have  determined  its  character.  It  was  approved  by 
President  Jackson  on  June  28.  By  it  the  weight  of  the  gold 
coins  thereafter  issued  was  to  be  about  six  and  a  quarter- per 
cent  less  than  under  the  law  of  1792.  This,  says  Mr. 
L,aughlin,*  debased  the  gold  coins  of  the  United  States  6.26 
per  cent,  and  to  that  extent  the  law  gave  gold  a  less  legal- 
tender  value  than  it  had  possessed  before  1834.  (The  italics 
are  my  own.) 

But  is  this  debasement  f  It  would  seem  rather  to  be  a 
provision  for  the  manufacture  of  another  kind  of  com- 
modity. Debasement  of  a  coin  implies  its  being  called  in  by 
the  government,  in  a  more  or  less  despotic  manner,  and  the 
enforced  substitution  of  one  of  less  value.  It  is  a  deprecia- 
tion of  the  monetary  unit  under  forms  of  law,  an  arbitrary 
political  attempt  to  get  something  for  nothing.  In  the 
present  instance,  however,  there  were  very  few  coins  which 
could  be  called  in,  nine- tenths  of  all  those  issued  having  been 
exported  or  melted,  and  provision  was  made  in  the  law  for 
rating  such  as  still  existed  and  were  presented  at  the  Mint 

*  "  History  of  Bimetallism  in  the  United  States,"  p.  70. 


1 8  ANNAI^  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

in  proportion  to  the  pure  metal  they  contained.  Before  1834 
an  amount  of  gold  worth  103  or  104  cents  had  been  legal 
tender  for  $i.  But  certainly  this  was  not  a  very  valuable 
privilege  of  which  owners  of  gold  were  deprived.  The  old 
gold  coins  had  not  served  as  money  in  America  for  twenty 
years  and  more. 

But  it  was  now  desired  for  two  reasons  to  secure  a  gold  cur- 
rency. For  twenty  years  the  currency  question  had  been 
under  discussion.  It  had  been  made  the  subject  of  special 
investigations  by,  and  lengthy  reports  to,  Congress.  Secre- 
taries of  the  Treasury,  notably  Crawford  in  1820  and  Ingham 
in  1830,  had  vied  with  Chairmen  of  Congressional  Committees 
— L,owndes  in  1819,  Sanford  in  1830,  and  C.  P.  White  in 
several  reports  from  1831  to  1834; — secretaries  had  vied 
with  chairmen,  in  preparing  extended  treatises  on  the  nature 
and  character  of  currency  and  in  devising  plans  for  improv- 
ing the  condition  of  American  currency.  But  Congress 
paid  little  heed  to  reports  and  petitions.  The  paper  currency 
of  the  country  and  foreign  silver  coin  continued  to  serve  as 
the  money  of  the  community.  It  was  in  the  interest  of 
those  who  supplied  the  former  to  maintain  as  strong  a 
demand  and  as  complete  a  monopoly  as  possible.  The 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  said  in  a  letter  to  the  Committee 
of  Ways  and  Means  that  the  great  evil  of  the  currency  was 
the  disproportion  between  the  paper  in  circulation  and  the 
coin  prepared  to  redeem  it,  and  urged  that  the  first  step 
toward  a  sound  currency  was  to  reform  the  coinage  of  gold.* 
Only  a  gold  currency,  it  was  claimed,  could  compete  with, 
or  form  a  proper  basis  for,  a  paper  currency.  The  fancied 
special  interest  of  a  particular  class,  the  owners  of  gold 
mines,  added  the  impulse  needed  to  secure  legislation. 

Some  sort  of  currency  a  community  must  have.  Indus- 
trial and  commercial  needs  compel  its  creation.  The  law 
only  regulates  it  or  invites  the  creation  of  a  particular  kind. 
The  general  public  accept  foreign  coins  and  a  voluminous 

*  Quoted  in  the  Debates  in  Congress,  Vol.  X.,  p.  4644. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  19 

paper  currency  based  on  them,  despite  the  disadvantages 
and  dangers,  until  a  stronger  interest  is  enlisted  in  supply- 
ing a  better  currency.  The  first  requisite  of  the  currency 
for  ordinary  transactions  is  that  it  be  simple,  convenient  and 
uniform.  A  great  variety  of  bank-notes  and  of  foreign 
coins,  of  different  values  in  different  portions  of  the  trading 
community,  cannot  constitute  a  good  currency.  The  first 
improvement  to  seek  is  uniformity,  and  thus  familiarity. 
Fips  and  tuppenny  bits  will  circulate  till  worn  smooth  as 
glass,  and  paper  dollars  until  badly  torn,  patched  and  dirty, 
simply  because  they  are  familiarly  known.  It  had  been 
expected  that  the  Bank  would  secure  the  desired  end.  But 
in  his  first  message  to  Congress,  in  December,  1829,  Jackson 
stated  that  the  bank  had  entirely  failed  in  the  effort  to 
establish  a  uniform  and  sound  currency.  Certainly  this 
statement,  and  the  subsequent  policy  of  the  administration 
in  the  contest  with  the  bank,  was  not  calculated  to  secure 
to  the  currency  either  uniformity  or  soundness.  There  was 
thus  apparently  another  reason  for  currency  legislation. 

In  the  early  period  the  question  had  been,  Shall  we  have 
American  coins?  The  issue  was  entirely  between  the 
acceptance  of  the  system  of  foreign  coins  left  over  from 
colonial  days  and  the  substitution  of  domestic  or  home-made, 
national,  coins.  The  foreign  coins  and  a  paper  currency 
won  the  day.  The  question  now  was,  Shall  we  have  coin 
or  paper,  hard  or  soft  money  ?  The  practical  question 
before  Congress  concerned  the  legal  restrictions  and  regula- 
tions necessary  to  secure  the  chief  requisite  of  a  credit  cur- 
rency— soundness.  The  great  desideratum  in  money  is 
stability.  That  the  dollar,  the  monetary  unit,  should  be 
invariable  becomes  increasingly  important  as  the  use  of 
credit  instruments  is  extended.  A  measure,  or  standard, 
cannot  be  good  if  variable. 

In  1834  the  basis  of  our  credit  currency  was  made  up  of 
foreign  coins  and  the  fractional  silver  coins.  Foreign  gold 
coins  had  ceased  to  be  legal  tender  in  1819.  L,ittle  gold  of 


20  ANNAI^  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

any  kind,  native  or  foreign,  remained  in  circulation  after 
1820.  The  silver  coins  were  old  and  worn.  The  larger 
part  were  Spanish — the  only  foreign  coins  which  were  legal 
tender  from  1827  to  1834.  They  had  been  in  circulation 
from  twenty  to  one  hundred  years.  The  bulk  of  the  cur- 
rency was  paper — the  notes  of  a  great  number  of  banks. 
These  banks  were  of  every  degree  of  solvency,  but  the 
government  received  their  notes  until  the  issuance  of  the 
famous  specie  circular  in  1836.  American  coins  were  few. 
The  old  Spanish  coins  were  the  nearest  existing  approxima- 
tion to  a  standard  of  value.  The  currency  was  neither 
uniform,  convenient  nor  simple,  and  it  was  maintained  that 
this  coinage  system  was  allowed  to  continue  in  order  to 
promote  the  use  of  bank-paper  and  preserve  the  unsatisfac- 
tory condition  of  the  currency  in  the  interest  of  gamblers 
I  and  dishonest  speculators. 

A  new  mint  had  been  built  in  1831,  and  a  bill  to  revise 
the  coinage  system  passed  in  the  Senate.  From  the  stand- 
point of  the  government,  there  was  evident  folly  in  main- 
taining this  mint  in  the  comparative  idleness  entailed  by  the 
law  as  it  then  existed,  or  in  using  it  to  manufacture  gold 

I  and  silver  for  export.     The  capacity  of  the  mint  was  double, 

possibly  treble,  the  amount  issued  in  the  years  immediately 
preceding  1834.  It  was  used,  moreover,  as  it  was  again 
later  when  the  quantity  of  gold  greatly  increased,  simply  as 
an  inexpensive  means  of  getting  metal  into  a  convenient 
form  for  exportation.  It  was  clear  that  the  coinage  of  gold 
should  be  entirely  abandoned,  or  means  provided  for  secur- 
ing the  circulation  at  home  of  the  coins  which  were  made  at 
government  expense.  Gold  had  never  been  an  important 
factor  in  our  currency.  The  premium  in  New  York  from 
1827  to  1834  was  from  three  to  ten  per  cent.  To  retain  the 
gold  coin  and  make  it  the  chief  component  of  our  currency, 
it  must  be  made  so  as  not  to  be  more  expensive  than  the 
silver  coin,  and  together  with  silver  it  must  also  meet  the 
conditions  of  competition  with  paper.  To  accomplish  these 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  21 

ends  was  the  avowed  purpose  of  the  supporters  of  the  Gold 
Coin  Bill  of  1834. 

On  March  29,  1834,  Benton  introduced  in  the  Senate  a 
resolution  for  a  joint  committee  to  report  what  alterations, 
if  any,  were  necessary  to  be  made  : — 

First,  in  the  value  of  the  gold  coined  at  the  mint,  ' '  so  as 
to  check  the  exportation  of  that  coin,  and  to  restore  it  to 
circulation. ' ' 

Second,  ' '  in  the  laws  relative  to  foreign  coins,  so  as  to  re- 
store the  gold  and  silver  coins  of  foreign  nations  to  their 
former  circulation  within  the  United  States. ' ' 

Third, in  the  regulations  for  the  collection  of  the  revenue, 
with  a  view  to  making  the  revenue  system  instrumental  in 
' '  the  introduction  of  gold  and  silver  for  the  common  currency 
of  the  country." 

From  this  presentation  of  the  subject  it  would  appear  that 
the  ultimate  object  and  the  practical  difficulties  were  the  same 
in  1834  that  they  had  been  in  1792.  little,  if  anything,  had 
been  accomplished  in  the  effort  to  provide  the  country  with 
a  sound  and  uniform  currency.  The  important  questions  as 
to  the  nature  of  the  money-unit  and  the  proper  legal  ratio 
between  the  two  kinds  of  coin  were  still  unanswered. 

As  finally  passed,  the  law  made  no  change  in  the  silver 
coins,  but  reduced  the  weight  of  the  gold  eagle  to  232 
grains  of  pure  metal,  thereby  raising  the  ratio  to  a  trifle 
over  16  to  i — 371^  to  23^,  or  16.002.  This  ratio  had  been 
proposed  by  Secretary  Crawford  ten  years  earlier.  Mr. 
lyowndes  had  recommended  15.6  to  i  in  1819,  though  the 
Director  of  the  Mint  had  at  that  time  reported  the  ratio  of 
1 6  to  i  as  the  market  rate  prevailing  in  some  parts  of 
Europe.  A  select  ccmmittee  of  the  Senate,  in  1830,  had 
proposed  15.9  to  i,  a  mean  between  different  legal  rates 
established  by  the  various  countries  of  Europe  and  the  com- 
mercial rate  prevailing  in  South  America — the  country 
whence  came  our  supply  of  silver.  These  various  recom- 
mendations would  indicate  honest  differences  of  opinion. 


22  ANNAI^  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

The  market  rate  is  a  matter  of  fact ;  but  a  matter  of  fact  diffi- 
cult to  determine  with  accuracy.  As  now  stated  in  the 
report  of  the  Director  of  the  Mint,  the  average  rate  for  the 
year  1833  was  15.93.  ^n  1808,  1812,  and  1813  it  was  above 
1 6,  and  prior  to  1834  it  was  frequently  above  15.8.  Mr. 
Jones,  of  Georgia,  insisted  in  debate  that  the  divergence  of 
the  proposed  legal  rate  from  the  existing  market  rate  was 
only  24  of  one  Per  cent,  and  he  justified  the  mint  rate  of  16 
to  i  on  the  ground  of  a  probable  further  advance  in  the  ratio. 
Mr.  Gorham  replied  that  the  rate  here  was  15.63  ;  that  in 
France  it  was  15.68,  and  in  England  15.77.  He  conse- 
quently maintained  that  the  contemplated  regulation  con- 
cerning gold  coins  would  add  two  and  one-half  per  cent  to 
the  value  of  gold  coins.  Assuming  the  correctness  of  his 
figures  this  makes  evident  not  only  the  impossibility  of 
bimetallism  under  the  new  law,  but  the  fact  that  in  passing 
it  Congress  would  be  responsible  for  a  perceptible  lowering  of 
the  standard  of  value — "  the  greatest  wrong  charged  against 
the  tyrants  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  one  which  no  modern 
despot  has  dared  to  repeat."* 

From  these  statements  made  in  debate,  it  would  appear 
that  a  bimetallic  controversy  took  place  in  the  Twenty-third 
Congress.  Stronger  interests  had  developed  on  each  side. 
Monometallism  (of  silver  money)  was  the  acknowledged 
fact  in  our  coin  currency.  The  standard  of  value,  in  so  far 
as  there  was  one,  was  in  silver,  though  it  must  remain  a 
matter  of  doubt  whether  the  standard  was  the  ideal  unit  of 
two  half  dollars,  which  contained  371^  grains,  or  the  worn 
Spanish  coins,  which  when  issued  contained,  some  of  them, 
365,  and  others  374,  grains  to  the  dollar.  Silver  monometal- 
lism was  not,  however,  so  generally  accepted  in  1830,  as  the 
permanent  policy  of  the  country,  as  bimetallism  had  been 
in  1792.  It  was  by  many  deemed  advisable  to  resuscitate 
the  gold  currency.  If  this  was  to  be  attempted,  the  practi- 
cal question  of  ratio  would  become  the  point  of  issue. 

*  Sumner,  "  History  of  American  Currency,"  p.  in. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          23 

Should  it  be  less  than,  equal  to,  or  greater  than  the 
commercial  rate?  And  what  was  the  real  commercial 
rate?  The  (silver)  monometallists  who  were  anxious 
to  preserve  the  standard  unchanged,  and  fearful  lest  gold 
should  be  overvalued  in  the  coins,  and  thus  the  standard  be 
lowered,  sought  to  place  the  mint  rate  lower  than  the  market 
rate,  and  insisted  on  the  ratio  of  15.625  to  i  as  the  highest 
which  could  safely  be  adopted.  In  the  House  this  was  voted 
too  low,  the  vote  standing  52  to  127.  Bimetallists — those 
who  desired  joint  circulation  of  both  kinds  of  coins,  the  gold 
for  the  large,  the  silver  for  the  small,  transactions — urged 
that  the  mint  rate  for  gold  might  be  slightly  higher  than  the 
market  rate.  Silver  being  a  heavier  metal  and  the  coin 
larger,  it  would  circulate  in  retail  trade  though  undervalued. 
The  ratio  of  16  to  i  was  approved  in  the  House  by  a  vote 
of  145  to  36,  the  compromise  rate  of  15.865  having  been 
voted  down — 69  to  112. 

It  would  thus  appear  that  an  honest  difference  of  opinion 
existed  both  as  to  what  was  the  commercial  value  of  gold  in 
terms  of  silver  and  as  to  how  far  the  legal  rate  could  prac- 
tically diverge  therefrom,  under  the  circumstances  then 
existing,  without  expelling  silver  or  gold  from  circulation. 
The  metal  market  was  not  active  and  settled.  The  original 
unit  had  not  been  exactly  defined,  and  the  ratio  formerly 
adopted,  15  to  i,  was  founded  on  information  which  was 
more  or  less  vague  and  incorrect.  The  conditions  had  not 
greatly  changed  in  1834.  The  situation  is  made  difficult, 
and  the  making  of  any  dogmatic  statement  as  to  the  inten- 
tion of  the  law-makers  is  prevented  by  the  impossibility  of 
ascertaining  the  facts  regarding  the  market  price  of  metals.  .. 
The  result  is  not  clearly  proved.  Certainly,  no  active 
business  could  be  conducted  in  buying  up  dollars  which  had 
not  been  coined.*  It  seems  doubtful  whether  the  standard 
was  appreciably  reduced,  even  through  the  psychological 
influence  of  the  new  statute.  Neither  the  movement  of  the 

*  Andrews,  "  Institutes  of  Economics,"  p.  204. 


24  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

coin  nor  the  change  in  the  standard  of  value  in  the  com- 
munity would  appear  to  have  been  automatic  to  the  degree 
implied  by  the  statements  of  extreme  monometallists. 

While  the  injustice  of  actual  debasement  is  unquestion- 
able, a  doubt  may  be  fairly  entertained  as  to  the  fact  in  any 
particular  instance.  The  commercial  rate  varied  from  year 
to  year*  and  was  different  in  the  different  markets  with  which 
we  had  direct  commercial  intercourse ;  16  to  i  appears  to  have 
been  the  average  market  rate.  The  excess  of  imports  over 
exports  of  coin  and  bullion  for  the  years  1834  to  1839  was  : 
gold,  $23,542,326.00  ;  silver,  $26,801,954.00.  In  the  years 
1834  to  1 842  silver  was  coined  to  the  value  of  $22,295,339.60, 
while  only  $19,207,810  worth  of  gold  was  coined.  It  is 
at  least  doubtful  what  actually  constituted  the  standard 
of  value  in  the  minds  of  the  people  in  1834 — the  American 
coins  not  in  use,  the  paper  currency,  or  the  current  Spanish 
coins  of  which  the  value  as  silver  was  so  various.  That  the 
experiment  cost  every  creditor  two  and  a  half  cents  on  every 
dollar,  as  Mr.  Sumner  states,  is  hardly  to  be  believed,  in  the 
light  of  the  above  figures  taken  in  connection  with  the 
mania  for  bank  circulation  and  the  enormous  speculation  of 
the 'years  1835,  1836  and  1837. 

It  is  true  the  ratio  adopted  proved  too  high.  Silver  did 
not  fall  so  low  again  until  1874.*  But  how  far  its  adoption 
was  due  to  an  error  of  judgment  on  the  part  of  sincere 
bimetallists  and  how  far  to  the  desire  to  ' '  encourage  and 
protect ' '  gold  mining  in  the  Southern  States,  or  how  far  it 
resulted  from  a  dishonest  intent  to  indirectly  scale  down 
debts  by  lowering  the  value  of  the  monetary  unit,  cannot  be 
determined.  Consideration  of  the  political  situation  leads  to 
the  inference  that  it  was  the  intention  of  the  majority  of 
those  in  power  to  overrate  gold  slightly.  The  desire  of  the 
administration  party  to  secure  a  specie  circulation  was  pre- 
sumably a  prevailing  force  in  the  minds  of  many.  Gold 
coins  were  necessary  to  the  success  of  their  plan.  To  gold  coin 

*  See  Diagrams  IV.  and  V. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          25 

should  consequently  be  given  the  benefit  of  any  doubt.  It 
was  desired  also  to  extend  the  market  for  gold.  Small 
amounts  had  been  coming  to  the  mint  from  North  Carolina 
ever  since  1804.  In  1824  one-fifth  and  in  1826  one-fourth 
of  the  total  amount  coined  was  "  native."  In  1832  there 
came  to  the  mint  from  the  Southern  Alleghanies  $678,000 
value  in  gold,  and  in  1833,  $868,000.* 

As  early  as  1829  a  committee  had  been  appointed  to  con- 
sider the  advisability  of  establishing  a  branch  mint  in  North 
Carolina.  One  was  organized  in  1838.  The  gold-mining 
interests  called  for  congressional  action  to  provide  a  market 
for  gold,  and  thus  raise  its  price.  Finally,  a  few  votes  or  parts 
of  votes  came  from  the  political  influence  of  those  who  were 
in  pecuniary  difficulties,  and  were  seeking  legislative  relief. 

But  the  charge  of  sinister  motives  is  based  quite  as 
properly  on  the  manner  in  which  the  act  was  passed  as  upon 
the  speculations  on  its  possible,  or  knowledge  of  its  actual, 
effects.  The  bill  which  had  been  under  discussion  during 
the  session,  and  been  passed  in  committee  of  the  whole, 
proposed  a  ratio  of  15.625  to  i,  and  the  fractional  parts 
alike  of  the  eagle  and  the  dollar  were  to  be  depreciated  from 
three  to  five  per  cent  of  the  standard  weight  and  to  be  made 
legal  tender  for  $10.00  only.  This  bill  was  dropped  at  the 
close  of  the  session  and  an  entirely  new  one  substituted — 
one  differing  in  principle  and  establishing  the  16  to  i  ratio. 
This  was  discussed  in  a  somewhat  slimly  attended  House 
only  a  week  before  adjournment,  and  received  but  scant 
attention  in  the  Senate  on  the  final  Saturday  morning.  The 
vote  in  its  favor  in  the  latter  body  was  35  to  7. 

Large  amounts  of  gold  were  immediately  coined,  and  by 
1840  began  that  excess  of  exports  over  imports  of  silver 
which  has  been  interrupted  only  three  times  since  then.f 

After  1843  the  amount  of  gold  coined  exceeded  that  of 
silver.  The  discovery  of  gold  in  1848  somewhat  reduced  its 

*  Sumner,  "Andrew  Jackson,"  p.  333. 
t  1843.  1846-47,  1861. 


26  ANNAI^S  OF  THK  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

value  in  the  years  following,  and  thus  greatly  increased  the 
divergence  between  the  mint  rate  and  the  market  rate  of  the 
metals.  In  1850  it  became  difficult  to  keep  fractional  silver 
in  circulation.  The  small  coins  even  were  worth  more  as 
silver  than  as  change,  and  their  worth  increased  in  1851  and 
1852.  Silver  was  thus  gradually  demonetized  under  the 
action  of  the  law  of  1834.  The  monetary  standard  of  the 
United  States  since  1837  has  been  23.22  grains  of  gold. 

FRACTIONAL   SILVER   COINS. 

The  second  change  of  importance  which  was  made  in  our 
coinage  system  was  the  reduction  made  in  the  weight  of  the 
fractional  silver  coins  under  the  Act  of  February  21,  1853. 
By  the  law  of  1792  they  had  contained  proportional  parts  of 
a  dollar — 412^  grains  gross  weight,  after  1837.  By  the 
statute  of  1853  they  were  reduced  in  weight  to  parts  of  384 
grains  to  the  dollar  and  coined  only  on  Government  account. 
The  provision  for  free  coinage  of  the  silver  dollar  was  not 
changed,  but  after  the  act  went  into  effect  no  deposits  of 
silver  bullion  were  received  for  the  purpose  of  coinage  into 
fractional  coins,  except  from  the  treasurer  of  the  mint.  The 
coins  were  to  be  sold  in  exchange  for  gold  in  amounts  of 
$100  worth  or  more,  face  value,  and  the  amount  of  quarter- 
dollars,  dimes  and  half-dimes  to  be  manufactured  was  left  to 
the  discretion  of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  the  treasurer 
of  the  mint  being  authorized  to  purchase  the  necessary 
amount  of  bullion.  The  smaller  silver  coins,  parts  of  a 
dollar,  were  thus  made  subsidiary  and  put  on  the  same  basis 
as  the  minor  or  token  coins,  the  profit  on  their  coinage  being 
from  time  to  time  turned  to  the  account  of  the  Treasurer  of 
the  United  States.  By  this  act  they  were  made  legal  tender 
only  in  payment  of  debts  for  sums  not  exceeding  $5.00. 
This  amount  was  increased  to  $10.00  by  the  Act  of  June  9, 
1879. 

This  Act  of  1853  was  tne  logical  outcome  of  the  increase 
in  the  production  of  gold  after  1848  and  the  consequent  fall 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          27 

in  its  value  as  compared  to  silver.  Soon  after  the  discovery 
of  new  mines  of  gold  the  silver  coins  rose  to  a  premium  of 
five  per  cent  and  quite  rapidly  disappeared  from  circulation. 
The  coinage  at  the  mint  fell  from  $2,558,580.00  in  1846  to 
only  $774,397.00  in  1851.  Small  change  became  very 
scarce.  The  demand  for  it  is  clearly  shown  in  the  mintage 
of  the  depreciated  three  cent  piece  which  was  only  ^  fine.* 
The  demand  is  also  shown  to  have  been  urgent  by  a  con- 
sideration of  the  amount  of  the  smaller  silver  coins  sold  after 
1853 — an  average  of  over  $5,000,000  worth  annually  for  the 
five  years  1853-58. 

Gold  and  silver  coins  were  now  again  unequal  in  value. 
Unless  the  variation  was  to  be  of  temporary  duration —  an 
hypothesis  which  did  not  appear  reasonable  at  the  time ; 
unless  the  equilibrium  was  soon  to  be  restored  by  natural  or 
industrial  causes  and  conditions,  it  was  a  matter  of  necessity 
that  some  alteration  be  made.  The  every  day  convenience 
of  trade  and  industry  demanded  it.  The  alternatives  were 
an  increase  of  four  or  five  per  cent  in  the  weight  of  gold  in 
the  gold  coins,  or  a  corresponding  decrease  of  the  silver  in 
the  silver  coins.  To  the  former  remedy  Mr.  Skelton  offered 
the  objectionf  that  increase  in  the  weight  of  the  gold  cur- 
rency of  the  country  would  compel  a  man  possessing  a 
quantity  of  gold  coin  to  receive  less  than  a  dollar  for  that 
piece  of  money  stamped  with  one  dollar  upon  its  face.  To 
prevent  this  injustice  the  government  might  redeem  the  old 
coins  at  their  face  value  in  the  new  ones  to  be  issued,  at  an 
expense  of  $15,000,000  or  $20,000,000.  The  one  alterna- 
tive government  could  not  afford ;  the  other  was  virtual 
robbery  of  the  individual  by  Act  of  Congress.  ' '  We  should 
meet  that  difficulty  when  we  return  home  to  our  constitu- 
encies," remarked  Mr.  Skelton.  Mr.  Dunham  added  :  "It 
is  using  the  power  of  the  government  for  the  benefit  of 

*  It"  amounted  to  nearly  $1,100,000.00  in  the  years  1851  to  1853,  while  only  $200,- 
ooo  worth  was  issued  between  1853,  when  the  coin  was  reduced  (or  rather  raised) 
to  the  standard  of  nine-tenths  fine  and  1873,  when  its  coinage  was  discontinued. 

t  Congressional  Globe,  Vol.  XXVI     p.  492. 


28  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

capital  at  the  expense  of  labor — of  the  rich  at  the  expense 
of  the  poor."* 

It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  the  average  Congressman 
should  choose  rather  to  reduce  the  fractional  silver  than  to 
raise  the  value  of  the  gold  coin,  although  it  was  clearly  recog- 
nized that  the  disparity  in  the  coins  existed  because  of  a  fall 
in  the  value  of  gold  and  that  so-called  theoretical  justice  de- 
manded an  increase  in  the  weight  of  the  gold  coin  as  a  means 
at  once  of  equalizing  the  coins  and  maintaining  the  standard. 

That  the  act  could  or  would  depreciate  the  standard  of 
value,  or  that  it  did  so,  is  not  apparent.  True,  fractional 
silver  coins  are  debased  coins.  They  are  token  coins,  and 
the  government  makes  a  profit  at  present  prices  of  about 
forty f  cents  on  every  dollar's  worth  sold.  But  they  are 
worth  their  face  value  by  reason  of  the  fact  of  the  limitation 
of  the  supply.  There  is  a  government  monopoly.  The 
only  way  to  obtain  two  half-dollars  is  to  pay  their  nominal 
value  to  the  government  in  legal  tender.  Thus,  the  stand- 
ard of  value  cannot  be  affected.  People  are  not  deprived 
of  their  rights,  laborers  are  not  robbed  of  their  hire,  by  being 
paid  in  the  debased  silver  coins. 

It  was  a  condition  and  not  a  theory  which  presented  itself 
in  1850.  It  was  a  practical  difficulty  under  which  the  coun- 
try was  laboring.  The  small  paper  tickets  of  an  earlier 
generation  were  again  coming  into  use.  The  object  of  the 
law  was  simply  to  supply  small  silver  change — a  much 
more  convenient  form  of  currency.  As  stated  in  a  petition 
from  the  New  Jersey  Legislature,  "It  could  not  in  the 
slightest  degree  disturb  the  monetary  affairs  of  the  nation, 
or  infringe  existing  rights  in  contracts."  It  might  with 
some  propriety  be  urged,  as  was  stated  by  Mr.  Jones,  of 
Tennessee,  that  ' '  making  gold  the  standard  was  something 
like  making  standards  of  tobacco,  rice,  cotton,  or  any  other 
of  the  staple  productions  of  the  country. ' '  Gold  at  the  time 

*  Appendix, Congressional  Globe,  Vol.  XXVII.,  p.  191. 
„   t  Estimating  silver  at  85  cents  per  ounce. 


USE   OF  SILVER   IN  THE   UNITED   STATES. 


29 


seemed  almost  as  unstable  a  measure  as  silver  became  in  the 
years  following  1873.  But  depreciation  does  not  necessarily 
follow  debasement,  and  in  the  instance  in  question  was  cer- 
tain not  to  follow.  Debasement  of  the  fractional  silver  coins 
had  no  more  effect  than  the  debasement  of  the  copper  coins 
on  the  fluctuation  of  the  money  unit.  They  were  not 
allowed  to  decline  in  value. 

Despite  the  evident  public  need  for  a  simple  and  conven- 
ient retail  currency,  but  little  interest  was  taken  in  the 
bill.  It  was  first  introduced  by  the  Finance  Committee  in 
the  Senate,  March  8,  1852.  On  the  twenty-ninth  Mr.  Hun- 
ter asked  the  Senate  to  take  it  up,  remarking :  "I  believe 
there  is  no  objection  to  it.  We  can  pass  it  this  evening." 
There  appeared  to  be  no  objection,  and  it  was  ordered  en- 
grossed for  the  third  reading,  and  passed  without  discussion 
on  the  day  following.  For  some  reason  it  did  not  appear  in 
the  House  until  May  3.  It  was  then  referred  to  the  Com- 
mittee of  Ways  and  Means,  but  was  not  brought  up  for  dis- 
cussion until  February  i,  1853.  On  that  day  it  was 
introduced  with  a  speech  by  Mr.  Dunham,  explaining  its 
provisions  and  the  reasons  for  some  four  or  five  proposed 
amendments.  It  was  discussed  on  the  two  following  days, 
but  only  during  the  morning  hour,  and  was  not  again 
brought  up  until  February  15,  when  the  amendments  were 
voted  down  by  large  majorities,  and  the  bill  passed  as  it 
came  from  the  Senate — "  Ayes,  94  ;  noes,  not  counted." 

The  opposition  to  the  bill  in  the  House  came  almost 
entirely  from  those  who  insisted  that,  in  spite  of  the  limita- 
tion as  to  the  amount  to  be  coined,  the  bill  depreciated  the 
standard  and  provided  for  the  issuance  of  a  new  kind  of  coin 
which  would  complicate  rather  than  simplify  the  monetary 
system.  The  reverse  proved  to  be  the  case.  The  coin  intro- 
duced increased  the  uniformity  in  our  coinage  system  and 
met  the  wants  of  the  trading  community. 

There  seems  to  have  been  no  opposition  on  the  part  of 
bimetallists. 


30  ANNAI^S  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

The  discussion  of  the  bill  does  not  indicate  the  existence 
of  any  firm  conviction  of  the  desirability  or  the  feasibility 
of  securing  concurrent  circulation  by  making  the  mint  ratio 
the  same  as  the  market  ratio.  The  usual  charges  were 
made  that  the  government  was  * '  tinkering ' '  with  the 
currency  and  that  the  act  was  mere  legislative  quackery, 
and  inaction  was  declared  to  be  the  best  remedy  for  the  ex- 
isting trouble.  But  no  serious  effort  was  made  to  obtain 
bimetallism.  For  a  number  of  years  gold  had  been  unmis- 
takably the  standard  and  the  supporters  of  the  measure 
distinctly  avowed  their  intention  to  let  it  remain  so  ;  to  cause 
legal  recognition  of  the  fact,  and  in  part  to  adapt  silver  to 
this  standard  by  reducing  the  weight  of  the  coins  most 
needed  in  retail  trade  so  that  they  would  be  below  par  as 
merchandise.  Nothing  is  said  in  the  act  about  the  dollar — 
the  coin  which  practically  had  never  been  coined  ;  but  in  his 
speech  introducing  the  bill  in  the  House,  Mr.  Dunham 
expressed  the  desire  of  the  committee  to  have  the  standard 
currency  consist  of  gold  only,  and  stated  that  the  effect  of 
the  bill  would  be  to  make  the  proposed  silver  coins  entirely 
subordinate  by  reason  of  the  degree  of  their  debasement  ; 
that  they  would  be  used  rather  as  token  than  as  standard 
currency,  ' '  applicable  and  convenient,  not  for  large  but  for 
small  transactions. ' ' 

It  is  indicative  alike  of  the  small  amount  of  interest 
manifested  in  the  subject  and  of  the  carelessness  of  legisla- 
tors that  the  first  section  of  the  bill  stated  that  it  was  to  go 
into  effect  in  June,  1852.  It  was  the  expectation  of  the 
Senate  Committee  that  it  would  be  passed  the  first  ses- 
sion, but  it  was  delayed  until  near  the  end  of  the  second 
session  and  passed  in  the  House  as  it  came  from  the  Senate  ; 
this  provision  of  the  first  section,  therefore,  required  the 
impossible,  and  it  was  necessary  to  rectify  the  blunder  by  a 
clause  in  the  Deficiency  Bill.  The  Act  went  into  effect 
April  i,  1853. 

In  the  light  of  the  current  discussion  of  the  currency 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  31 

question  it  is  interesting  to  note  that  the  protective  argu- 
ment was  used  in  1853  in  behalf  of  a  single  gold  standard 
and  a  gold  currency  just  as  it  is  now  urged  in  favor  of  the 
free  coinage  of  the  silver  dollar.  Gold  is  the  production  of 
our  own  country :  silver  is  not.  L,et  us,  therefore,  it  was 
urged,  use  our  own  productions  and  in  so  far  increase  their 
value.  It  is  another  instance  of  attempt  to  make  private 
interest  appear  public  blessing,  if  not  to  substitute  private 
for  public  benefits. 

After  1848  the  amount  of  gold  coined  each  year  at  the 
mints  of  the  United  States  increased  as  follows,  in  millions 
of  dollars:  1849,  9;  1850,  32;  1851,  62.6;  1852,  56.8. 
No  one  could  suppose  that  such  a  quantity  of  coin  would  be  at 
once  introduced  into  the  circulation  of  the  country.  Putting 
the  metal  through  the  mint  was  simply  an  easy  way  of  getting 
it  manufactured  into  a  marketable  form.  Provision  was 
consequently  made  in  this  Act  for  the  manufacture  of  bars 
or  ingots,  either  of  pure  or  standard  metal,  at  a  charge,  not 
above  cost,  to  be  fixed'  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury. 
By  this  provision  it  becomes  possible,  in  part  at  least,  to 
separate  the  metal  designed  for  use  in  the  arts  from  that 
which  is  to  go  into  circulation  as  coin  and  to  place  the 
expense  for  manufacture  of  the  latter  only  on  the  government 
and  thus  on  the  general  public. 

REORGANIZATION   OF   THE   MINT. 

The  act  of  February  12,  1873,  was  at  once  a  codification 
and  a  revision  of  the  laws  relating  to  the  coinage  system  of 
the  United  States  and  to  the  business  of  minting.  It  is 
entitled  :  ' '  An  Act  revising  and  amending  the  Laws  relative 
to  the  Mints,  Assay-offices,  and  Coinage  of  the  United 
States. "  By  it  our  coinage  system  was  somewhat  extended 
and  the  work  of  making  coins  more  carefully  systematized. 
The  many  provisions  of  the  sixty  and  more  different  laws 
regarding  the  mint  and  its  branches,  the  assay  offices,  and 
the  coinage  of  the  United  States,  which  had  been  enacted  in 


32  ANNALS  OF  THE:  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

the  eighty  years  preceding  and  were  still  in  force,  were 
incorporated  into  a  single  statute.  Inconsistencies  were 
removed ;  discrepancies  rectified ;  and  the  whole  body  of 
enactments  simplified  as  far  as  possible.  It  was  spoken  of 
in  debate*  as  ' '  a  code  for  the  government  of  the  whole 
subject,  carefully  drawn,  after  months  of  thorough  prepara- 
tion, as  the  result  of  the  best  judgment  of  the  department 
and  the  country. ' ' 

The  Bureau  of  the  Mint  was  established  in  the  treasury 
department,  for  purposes  of  supervision  over  the  various 
branches  of  the  service,  and  for  the  collection  of  statistics. 
Further  changes  in  the  law  were  adopted,  but  they  relate 
chiefly  to  the  business  methods  employed,  or  to  be  employed, 
in  the  mints  and  the  assay  offices.  The  law  principally  con- 
cerns administration,  specifying  the  manner  in  which  govern- 
ment officers  shall  perform  their  duties.  It  had  been  drafted 
by  the  Deputy  Comptroller  of  the  Currency,  Mr.  John  Jay 
Knox,  and  was  designed  to  facilitate  public  business  and  to 
promote  the  efficiency  of  the  government  service. 

Three  changes  were  made  in  the  kinds  of  coin  to  be  issued. 
One  copper  coin,  the  two-cent  piece,  was  omitted  from  the 
list  of  coins  the  Director  of  the  Mint  was  authorized  to  have 
coined.  The  coinage  of  three  silver  coins,  the  half-dime, 
the  three-cent  piece  and  the  dollar,  was  also  discontinued. 
The  manufacture  of  a  trade  dollar  was  authorized.  But  no 
change  whatever  was  made  in  regard  to  the  gold  coins  to  be 
manufactured . 

Purely  practical  reasons  were  given  for  each  of  these 
changes  in  the  list  of  coins.  The  two-cent  piece  had  not 
found  a  ready  market.  The  public  did  not  care  for  it, 
though  it  might  make  use  of  a  two-and-a-half-cent  piece. 
The  half-dime  and  three-cent  piece  in  silver  were  incon- 
venient coins,  like  the  gold  dollar,  which  has  since  been 
discon  tinned,  f 

*  By  Mr.  Casserly,  in  the  Senate,  January  9,  1871.   Congressional  Globe,  3d  Sess., 
Forty-first  Cong.  p.  372. 
t  Act  of  September  26,  1890.    See  Statement  A  in  the  Appendix. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          33 

The  silver  dollar  for  some  years  had  been  worth  about 
$1.03  in  gold;  since  the  passage  of  the  Gold  Coin  Bill  of 
1834  the  nne  silver  m  a  silver  dollar  (371^  grains)  had 
been  worth  somewhat  more  than  23.22  grains  of  fine  gold, 
and  as  a  consequence  the  silver  dollar  had  not  circulated  in 
the  country.  It  was  used  chiefly  "  as  a  convenient  portion 
of  silver  in  the  laboratory  of  the  metallurgist,  or  was  hoarded 
as  an  object  of  curiosity."*  The  average  amount  annually 
issued  from  1839  to  1869  was  only  a  little  over  100,000,  and 
of  the  total  8,031,238  issued  between  1792  and  1873,  nearly 
one-half  were  made  in  the  years  following  1865,  and  were 
manufactured  almost  exclusively  for  export.  In  1804,  when 
it  became  apparent  that  these  coins  were  not  used  to  form 
part  of  the  currency  of  the  country,  but  were  exported  to 
the  West  Indies,  the  administration  saw  fit,  without  the 
sanction  of  the  law,  to  discontinue  their  issue.  In  1873  the 
officers  of  the  government  recommended  simply  that 
authority  to  manufacture  be  withdrawn,  and  it  was  so 
enacted. 

Quite  other  reasons  have  since  been  assigned  by  some, 
both  for  the  recommendation  and  for  its  acceptance  by  Con- 
gress. The  anticipated  decline  in  the  value  of  silver,  it  has 
been  claimed,  led  to  the  demonetization  of  silver  in  1873. 
Some  feared  and  many  fully  expected  a  change  in  the  rela- 
tion of  the  two  metals,  and  hence  secured  a  revision  of  the 
law  in  order  to  insure  themselves  against  loss  or  to  prepare 
the  way  for  reaping  immense  harvests  through  the  fluctuation 
in  prices  and  the  fall  in  values.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is 
maintained  that  the  great  decline  in  the  value  of  silver  was 
as  little  foreseen,  and  could  have  been  as  little  foreseen,  in 
1873,  as  was  the  earlier  decline  in  the  value  of  gold.  Cer- 
tainly, accusation  of  the  legislators  of  either  period  is,  to 
say  the  least,  uncalled  for. 

The  debates  of  1873,  as  of  1853,  have  record  of  no 
bimetallic  controversy.  In  each  instance,  more  particularly 

*  Report  of  the  Comptroller  of  the  Currency,  1876,  p.  168. 


34  ANNANS  OF  THE;  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

the  latter,  its  occasion  had  been  lacking.  Between  1862 
and  1876  we  had  a  paper  currency.  Both  gold  and  silver 
coins  of  every  kind  and  description,  and  in  a  measure  even 
copper  coins,  were  driven  from  circulation  by  the  notes  of 
the  treasury,  of  the  national  banks,  and  of  individuals. 
They  had  ceased  to  be  part  of  the  circulating  medium  of  the 
country.  They  would  be  returned  only  upon  the  with- 
drawal of  the  depreciated  paper.  It  was  even  questioned  in 
debate  why  the  government  should  consider  the  relative 
merits  of  two  kinds  of  coin  neither  of  which  the  country 
possessed.  As  between  the  two,  there  was  apparently  no 
thought  of  so  changing  the  mint  rate  as  to  insure  their  joint 
circulation,  except  on  the  part  of  those  who  opposed  any 
debased  currency  whatsoever — even  the  fractional.  No  one 
proposed  to  attempt  the  re-establishment  of  bimetallism. 
For  that  purpose,  the  depreciation  of  the  silver  dollar  three 
per  cent  or  more  would  have  been  necessary,  and  some  plan 
for  forcing  the  depreciated  paper  to  par  and  maintaining  it 
in  a  state  of  convertibility  must  have  been  adopted. 

How  far  coming  events  cast  their  shadows  before  is  ever  a 
difficult  matter  to  determine,  but  that  the  changes  of  the 
years  from  1871  to  1876  could  have  been  anticipated  by  Mr. 
Knox  in  preparing  his  report  in  1869  hardly  seems  probable. 
It  is  certain  that  the  average  Congressman  in  1873  would  not 
have  found  it  possible  to  make  the  most  vague  approxima- 
tion to  the  rate  which  was  necessary  to  secure  bimetallism 
throughout  the  decade  that  followed.  That  the  victor  in  the 
Franco- Prussian  war  would  be  able  to  compel  the  payment 
of  a  gigantic  war  indemnity  of  $1,000,000,000,  and  would 
make  use  of  the  opportunity  to  change  the  currency  of 
Germany  from  silver  to  gold,  as  a  means  of  aiding  industrial 
development ;  that  between  1871  and  1874  nearly  every 
country  in  Europe  would  close  its  mint  to  the  coinage  of 
silver  and  keep  it  closed  ;  and  that  the  demand  for  silver  in 
the  countries  of  the  East,  India  and  China,  would  greatly 
decline  ;  that  the  production  of  silver  would  double,  treble 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          35 

and  quadruple  even  between  1868  and  1878  ;  that  an  almost 
unprecedented  industrial  depression  would  follow  the  panic 
of  1873  ;  that  these,  or  any  such  fortuitous  concatenation  of 
events  could  have  been  foreseen,  and  the  fall  in  the  value  of 
silver,  as  measured  in  gold,  been  predicted  with  any  accuracy, 
is  highly  improbable.  In  any  case  the  very  best  policy,  the 
one  which  most  completely  protected  the  interests  of  the  whole 
community  was,  perhaps,  the  one  adopted  in  the  Act  of 

1873- 

The  fall  in  silver,  coming  as  it  did  so  shortly  after  the 
failure  of  the  Greenback  party  in  1874,  gave  rise  to  bitter 
feelings  against  those  who  secured  the  enactment  of  the 
Mint  L,aw  of  1873.  Extremists  even  went  so  far  as  to  say 
that  silver  had  been  demonetized  by  clandestine  legislation. 
Nor  has  this  belief  disappeared  with  the  progress  of  time  ;  it 
is  still  current,  though  quite  unwarranted,  as  shown  by  the 
history  of  the  bill  in  its  passage  from  drafting  to  final  enact- 
ment. It  was  practically  before  Congress  and  before  the 
country  for  about  four  years.  In  his  report  in  1869  the 
Director  of  the  Mint  urged  the  restoration  of  a  silver  cur- 
rency ' '  for  change, ' '  in  lieu  of  the  postal  and  small-note 
currency,  as  the  first  step  toward  and  "  an  important  adju- 
vant to  a  general  resumption  of  specie  payments. ' '  A  year 
later  he  stated  that  a  number  of  our  leading  commercial 
newspapers  had  emphatically  endorsed  the  plan  and  he  ex- 
pressed the  belief  (1870)  that  the  product  of  silver  in  Nevada 
and  Colorado  would  be  sufficient  to  meet  the  demand.  His 
proposition  was  for  a  very  much  more  debased  kind  of  coin 
than  those  formerly  in  use,  and  in  defence  of  the  system  he 
quoted  the  following  significant  language  :  * '  This  is  not  a 
scheme  for  debasing  the  standard  of  value.  Its  only  object 
is  to  restore  silver  on  such  a  basis,  under  legal  sanctions,  as 
will  enable  it  to  keep  its  subsidiary  place,  whether  the  chief 
currency  be  paper,  as  it  now  is,  or  gold,  as  we  hope  it  will 
soon  be."* 

*  Finance  Report,  1870,  p.  422. 


36  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

The  draft  of  a  bill  in  which  the  plan  was  systematically 
worked  out  had  been  sent,  during  the  year  1869,  to  promi- 
nent financiers  and  the  important  government  officials,  for 
suggestion  and  comment.  In  its  perfected  form  it  was  in- 
troduced into  the  Senate  by  Mr.  Sherman,  April  28,  1870, 
and  referred  to  the  Finance  Committee.  The  letter  from 
the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  and  the  report  by  Mr.  Knox 
explaining  the  provisions  of  the  bill  were  printed  with  the 
bill. 

After  a  careful  investigation  the  bill  was  reported  in 
December  following.  It  was  discussed  during  the  morning 
hours  of  January  9  and  January  10,  1871,  and  passed  on  the 
second  day  by  a  vote  of  36  to  14,  22  being  absent.  Just  a 
year  later,  January  9  and  10,  1872,  the  bill  was  discussed 
in  the  House,*  and  recommitted.  On  February  9  it  was 
again  introduced.  Mr.  Hooper,  of  Massachusetts,  who  then 
had  the  bill  in  charge,  explained  in  his  speech  opening  the 
discussion  that  Section  16  provided  for  a  dollar  coin  of  384 
grains  of  silver  T%  fine,  ' '  making  it  a  subsidiary  coin  in  har- 
mony with  the  silver  coins  of  less  denomination,  to  secure 
its  concurrent  circulation  with  them."f  He  was  followed 
by  Mr.  Stoughton,  of  Michigan,  who  continued  the  expla- 
nation of  the  bill.  In  the  course  of  his  speech  he  made  the 
following  perfectly  plain  statement :  J  * '  The  office  of  the 
silver  or  '  subsidiary  '  coins  is  to  supply  the  public  want 
for  small  change.  They  are  made  the  tokens  of  value,  not 
the  value  itself,  and  are  designed  only  for  exchange  and 
circulation  at  home,  up  to  but  never  in  excess  of  the  require- 
ments of  trade." 

It  would  thus  appear  that  the  Committee  of  Coinage, 
Weights  and  Measures  was  not  endeavoring  to  conceal  its 
intentions.  They  proposed  to  carry  out  the  recommendation 
of  the  Director  of  the  Mint  and  provide  for  the  restoration 
of  silver  to  its  place  as  a  subsidiary  coin  in  our  currency,. 

*  Mr.  Kelly  had  introduced  the  bill  (H.  R.  No.  5)  in  the  new  Congress, 
t  Congressional  Globe,  Second  Session  Forty-second  Congress,  p.  2306. 
I  Congressional  Globe,  Second  Session  Forty-second  Congress,  p.  2309. 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          37 

making  this  the  first  step  toward  a  resumption  of  specie  pay- 
ments and  a  complete  restoration  of  the  currency  of  ante- 
bellum days.  The  final  vote  in  the  House  was  taken  under 
a  suspension  of  the  rules,  when  a  substitute  bill  was  passed 
May  27,  1872,  by  a  vote  of  no  to  13. 

Nearly  another  year  elapsed  before  the  bill  was  passed  in 
the  Senate,  on  January  17,  1873.  It  had  received  twenty 
amendments  on  its  journey  through  the  latter  body.  The 
House  did  not  concur.  The  Senate  insisted.  Conference 
became  necessary  to  pass  the  bill.  The  report  of  the  Con- 
ference Committee  was  agreed  to,  the  House  receding  from 
its  opposition  to  the  amendments  of  the  Senate  numbered 
i,  2,  3,  5,  7,  10,  n,  13,  14,  15,  16,  17,  18  and  20,  and  the 
wording  of  the  other  amendments  being  so  changed  as  to  be 
acceptable  to  both  Houses.  The  exact  character  of  the  bill 
was  thus  finally  determined  in  conference  committee,  but  its 
main  features,  so  far  as  a  change  of  the  coinage  is  concerned, 
had  been  under  contemplation  for  nearly  four  years.  If  the 
charge  of  clandestine  legislation  is  preferred  against  the 
legislators  of  1873  it  must  be  urged  with  equal  force  at  the 
bar  of  public  opinion  against  many  another  Congress  whose 
most  important  acts  have  been  shaped  by  a  Conference  Com- 
mittee chosen  to  remove  the  points  of  disagreement  between 
Senate  and  House. 

As  late  as  the  beginning  of  the  year  1872  it  appears  to 
have  been  a  matter  of  doubt  whether  the  silver  coins  were 
sufficiently  debased  under  the  Act  of  1853,  to  keep  them  in 
circulation.  On  January  8  Mr.  Kelly  introduced  a  resolution 
'  *  which  was  read,  considered,  and  adopted  by  the  House, ' ' 
instructing  the  Committee  on  Coinage,  Weights  and  Measures 
"  to  inquire  and  report  whether  the  intrinsic  value  of  the 
silver  coinage  is  not  above  that  of  other  nations  and  greater 
than  is  necessary  in  coins  designed  for  subsidiary  purposes 
only,  and  to  be  retained  permanently  in  the  country. ' ' 

The  difference  in  European  systems  of  coinage  was  five 
per  cent,  whereas  in  ours  the  smaller  silver  coins  were  then 


38  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

worth  only  about  four  per  cent  less  than  the  standard  gold 
coins.  To-day  they  are  worth  about  forty  per  cent  less,  and 
the  inducement  to  counterfeit  has  become  correspondingly 
great. 

Moreover,  the  recommendations  of  the  mint  authorities 
and  the  action  of  Congress  were  quite  in  harmony  with 
another  attempt  which  was  making  at  this  time — that  in 
favor  of  an  international  coinage  system. 

On  February  8,  1870,  Mr.  Sherman  introduced  the  fol- 
lowing resolution  in  the  Senate  : 

' '  Resolved,  That  the  President  be  requested,  if  not  incom- 
patible with  the  public  interests,  to  invite  a  correspondence 
with  Great  Britain  and  other  foreign  Powers,  with  a  view  to 
promote  the  adoption  by  the  Legislatures  of  the  several 
Powers  of  a  common  unit  and  standard  of  an  international 
gold  coinage,  and  that  such  correspondence  be  submitted  to 
Congress  for  its  information  and  action." 

The  Forty-first  Congress  was  at  least  consistent.  It  did 
not  attempt,  as  did  a  later  one,  to  secure  an  international 
agreement  for  a  common  unit  and  by  its  own  act  put  another 
barrier  in  the  way.  It  rather  undertook  to  bring  the  currency 
system  of  the  United  States  into  accord  with  that  of  the  most 
completely  developed  of  her  sisters  in  the  family  of  nations. 

Finally,  as  if  to  remove  the  last  shadow  of  doubt  as  to  the 
definite  intentions  of  the  administration,  we  have  the  recom- 
mendation of  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  in  his  report  for 
1872,  issued  when  the  bill  was  in  its  last  days.  Silver  had 
already  begun  to  depreciate.  Its  use  as  currency  had  been 
discontinued  by  Germany  and  some  other  countries.  The 
amount  mined  was  at  the  same  time  increasing.  Believing 
that  the  depreciation  of  silver  was  likely  to  continue, 
the  Secretary  urged  such  alterations  in  the  Mint  Bill  as 
would  ' '  prohibit  the  coinage  of  silver  for  circulation 
in  this  country."  He  fceld  that  no  attempt  should  be 
made  to  introduce  the  use  of  silver  as  currency,  but  "that 
the  coinage  should  be  limited  to  commercial  purposes, 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          39 

and  designed  exclusively   for  commercial  uses  with  other 
nations. ' ' 

It  was  in  carrying  out  the  policy,  recommended  by  the 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury,  that  authority  was  given  to  manu- 
facture the  ''Trade-dollar."  In  attempting  to  determine 
the  motives  which  led  to  the  discontinuance  of  the  silver 
dollar  due  consideration  must  be  given  to  this  fact,  that 
the  same  act  grants  the  right  to  have  the  more  valuable 
trade-dollar  manufactured  at  the  mint.  The  history  of  the 
trade-dollar  also  offers  an  exceedingly  interesting  lesson  in 
the  operation  of  currency  laws.* 

Section  21  of  the  Act  of  1873  provided  that  any  owner 
of  silver  bullion  might  ' '  deposit  the  same  at  any  mint  to  be 
formed  into  bars,  or  into  dollars  of  the  weight  of  four 
hundred  and  twenty  grains  Troy,  designated  in  this  act  as 
trade  dollars,  and  no  deposit  of  silver  for  other  coinage  shall 
be  received,  .  .  .  the  charges  for  converting  standard 
silver  into  trade  dollars  shall  equal  but  not  exceed  .  .  . 
the  actual  average  cost  to  each  mint  and  assay  office  of  the 
material,  labor,  wastage  and  use  of  machinery  employed," 
these  to  be  determined  by  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury. 
Under  this  provision  the  amounts  issued  in  millions  of  dollars 
were:  in  1873,  1.2;  in  1874,  4.9;  in  1875,  6.3;  in  1876, 
6.2;  in  1877,  13.1.  The  coinage  was  partially  suspended 
in  October,  1877,  an<^  finally  discontinued  by  the  act  of 
February  22,  1878. 

The  legal  tender  quality  of  the  trade-dollar,  limited  to- 
amounts  not  exceeding  five  dollars  in  any  one  payment,  was 
entirely  removed  by  the  act  of  July  26,  1876;  yet  as  many  of 
these  coins  were  made  after  this  date  as  before,  and  they 
remained  in  circulation  for  a  number  of  years  after  their  coin- 
age had  been  entirely  disallowed.  That  is  to  say,  the  Ameri- 
can people  persisted  for  several  years  in  having  manufactured 
and  in  using  a  coin  to  which  Congress  gave  no  sanction 

*  A  detailed  account  of  the  life  of  this  coin  is  given  in  the  report  of  the  Director 
of  the  Mint  for  1887,  pp.  96-100. 


4O  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

other  than  the  guarantee  of  an  honest  and  efficient  mint. 
From  1873  to  1875  these  coins  cost  somewhat  more  than  a 
dollar  each  in  the  United  States,  and  hence  no  one  could 
afford  to  use  them  as  money,  either  in  paying  debts  or 
buying  goods.  It  was  only  by  exporting  them  to  China 
and  the  Hast  that  the  expenses  of  their  coinage  could  be 
met.  In  1876  and  1877,  however,  they  cost  less  than  a 
dollar  apiece  to  manufacture,*  and  as  the  public  generally  con- 
tinued to  receive  them  at  their  face  value,  holders  of  bullion 
found  it  profitable  to  send  it  to  the  mint  for  coinage,  as  pre- 
scribed by  the  Act  of  1873,  into  a  42o-grain  trade-dollar. 

Of  the  total  amount  coined, f  one-fifth  (7,689,036)  was 
redeemed  at  face  value,  in  exchange  for  standard  silver 
dollars  or  subsidiary  silver  coins,  under  the  act  of  March  3, 
1887.  Nearly  all  the  remainder  have  been  permanently 
exported.  So  far  as  our  currency  is  concerned,  therefore, 
the  trade-dollar  has  become  a  thing  of  the  past. 

The  Act  of  1873  thus  appears  to  have  been  an  attempt  to 
ranonetize  rather  than  to  demonetize  silver.  By  the  Act 
of  1834  silver,  as  compared  with  gold,  had  been  undervalued 
in  our  coinage.  From  about  1840  down  to  1875  the  371^ 
grains  of  fine  silver  in  a  dollar  had  been  worth  more  than 
the  23.22  grains  of  fine  gold  in  a  dollar — from  one  to  ten 
cents  more.  During  all  this  time  Congress  had  failed  to 
rectify  the  mistake,  if  mistake  it  was,  that  had  been  made 
in  1834,  and  as  a  consequence  the  American  people  had 
used  a  gold  currency.  Silver  had  not  been  monetized ; 
indeed,  it  was  demonetized  by  the  public  during  this  period. 
The  only  monetization  took  place  under  the  Act  of  1853, 
debasing  the  fractional  silver  currency  and  limiting  the 
right  of  manufacture  by  abolishing  ' '  free  coinage ' '  and 
creating  the  government  monopoly. 

The  Act  of  1873  was  supplementary  to  the  Act  of  1853 
and  conceived  with  the  same  intent.  The  circulation  of 

*  See  Diagram, 
t  35,965,924- 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          41 

postal  currency  had  driven  silver  coins  out  of  circulation 
during  the  Civil  War  and  the  years  subsequent  thereto. 
The  proposition  was  made  in  1869  to  restore  silver  to  its 
position  as  a  subsidiary  com,  the  supply  from  Nevada  and 
Colorado,  it  was  believed,  making  this  feasible.  Any  excess 
in  the  silver  product  for  export  was  to  be  in  the  form  of  a 
' '  trade-dollar. ' '  An  American  silver  coin  had  never  been 
the  chief  component  of  American  currency,  and  there  was 
at  that  time  no  apparent  reason  for  attempting  to  introduce 
it.  For  a  generation  silver  had  been  used  as  the  metal  of 
our  subsidiary  coins.  It  remained,  then,  to  bring  the  dollar 
into  harmony  with  the  fractional  coins  or  to  retire  it  from 
the  circulation.  The  latter  alternative  was  chosen,  although 
the  former  had  been  recommended.  Provision  was  made  at 
the  same  time  for  the  manufacture  of  coins  of  a  convenient 
form,  with  quality  and  quantity  of  metal  marked  upon  each, 
which  could  be  used  in  trade  with  countries  having  a  silver 
currency. 

The  important  effect  of  this  law,  and  of  the  provision  of 
the  revised  statutes  (1874)  which  deprived  the  silver  dollar 
of  legal  tender  quality,  was  that  they  prevented  a  use  of  sil- 
ver which,  under  laws  previously  in  force,  would  inevitably 
have  followed  the  fall  in  the  value  of  silver  (1876)  and  the 
failure  of  the  Greenback  movement.  Whether  or  not  this 
was  a  desirable  result  is  a  much  disputed  question.  The 
belief  that  it  was  not  has  led  to  the  persistent  effort  of  the 
last  fifteen  years  to  extend  the  use  of  silver.  It  is  with  the 
passage  of  the  Act  of  January  14,  1875,  providing  for  the 
resumption  of  specie — that  is,  gold — payments  on  the  out- 
standing obligations  of  the  government,  that  the  real  bi- 
metallic controversy  in  this  country  begins.  It  has  been  carried 
on  alike  by  those  personally  interested,  as  they  believe,  in 
maintaining  the  stability  of  our  measure  of  value  and  stand- 
ard of  payments  and  by  those  who  are  anxious  for  the  general 
welfare  and  believe  that  industrial  growth  and  prosperity,  as 
well  as  political  justice,  demand  a  composite  unit  of  value. 


42  ANNAI^S  OF  THK  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

Thus  far  this  movement  for  bimetallism  has  resulted  in 
three  apparently  quite  fruitless  attempts  to  secure  inter- 
national agreement  regarding  the  coinage  of  gold  and 
silver,*  and  in  the  two  acts  requiring  the  United  States  Gov- 
ernment to  purchase  silver  as  the  basis  of  a  paper  currency. 

By  the  Act  of  February  28,  1878,  the  coinage  of  the  stand- 
ard silver  dollar  was  authorized  and  its  legal  tender  quality 
restored.  But  the  coinage  was  fixed  within  definite  limits 
and  to  be  made  on  government  account  only.  The  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury  was  instructed  to  purchase  not  less  than  two 
nor  more  than  four  million  dollars'  worth  of  silver  per  month 
and  have  it  coined  into  standard  dollars.  He  was  also  author- 
ized to  issue  certificates  for  the  deposit  of  these  coins,  which 
should  be  receivable  for  customs,  taxes  and  all  public  dues, 
and  when  so  received  might  be  reissued.  Nearly  400,000,- 
ooo  were  coined  under  this  act,  of  which  about  60,000,000 
remain  in  circulation  ;  the  remainder  are  covered  by  certifi- 
cates, or  are  lying  idle  in  the  vaults  of  the  government. 

The  Act  of  July  14,  1890,  known  as  the  Sherman  Act, 
directs  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury  to  purchase  four  and 
one-half  million  (4,500,000)  ounces  of  silver  per  month,  or 
such  part  thereof  as  may  be  offered  for  sale  at  prices  below 
$1.29  per  ounce,  and  to  issue  Treasury  Notes  in  payment. 
These  notes  are  a  legal  tender  at  their  face  value  * '  in  pay- 
ment of  all  debts,  public  and  private,  except  when  otherwise 
expressly  stipulated  in  the  contract."  They  are  redeemable 
in  either  gold  or  silver  coin  at  the  option  of  the  secretary. 
The  government  is  thus  made  a  regular  purchaser  of  silver, 
which  it  uses  as  the  basis  of  a  paper  currency  that  increases 
from  $40,000,000  to  $60,000,000  a  year,  according  as  the 
price  of  silver  rises  or  falls.  Thus  far  the  administration, 
Democratic  as  well  as  Republican,  has  been  able  to  redeem 

the  Treasury  Notes  in  gold. 

ARTHUR  B.  WOODFORD. 

School  of  Social  Economics. 

*  Held  at  Paris  in  1878  and  1881,  and  at  Brussels  in  18^2. 


APPENDIX, 


(43) 


44  ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 

STATEMENT  A. 

Showing  the  various  coins  issued  from  the  mints  of  the  United 
States,  the  date  at  which  they  were  authorized  and  discontinued,  and 
the  legal  tender  quality  of  each. 

Authorized.     Discontinued.  Legal  Tender. 
GOLD  (6,  2  discontinued). 

Double-eagle,    .    .  Mch.  3,  1849, For  any  amount. 

Eagle, Apr.  2, 1792, " 

Half-eagle 

Quarter-eagle,    .    .            "             " 

Dollar, Mch.  3,  1 849, Sept.  26, 1 890,  " 

Three-dollar  piece,  Feb.  2 1, 1 853,           "  " 


SILVER  (8,  4  discontinued). 

Dollar,     .....  Apr.  2,  1792,    ......      (Except  1874-1878;. 

f  For  any  amount  until 
Half  dollar  "  Feb. 


since  then. 
Three-cent  piece,    Mch.  3,  1851,  3oc. 

Twenty-centpiece,  Mch.  3,  i875,May  2,  .878,  {  "* 

Trade-doHar,     .    .  F*.i2,i873.  Feb.22,l878, 


COPPER  (2,  discontinued). 

Cent, Apr.  2,  1792,  Feb.  21,1857, 

Half-cent,  ....  " 


BRONZE  (2,  i  discontinued). 
Two-cent  piece,    .  Apr.22,i864,  Feb.  12,1873,  {  2Jj 

{"  loc.  till  Mch.  3,  1865. 
4c.  till  Feb.  12,  1873 
25C.  thereafter. 


NICKEL  (3,  2  discontinued). 

Cent, Feb.2i,  1857,  Apr.22, 1864, 

Three-cent  piece,  .  Mch.  3,  i865,Sept.26,,89o,  {  %£  ^J^'  '"' 
Five-cent  piece,    .MayI6,l866 {  f l 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


45 


STATEMENT  B. 

Showing  the  weight  and  fineness  of  the  gold  and  silver  coins  under 
the  various  statutes,  the  number  of  grains  to  the  dollar  being  given 
in  each  case. 


April  2,  1792. 

Gross  Pure 

weight.  Standard,   metal. 


Gold  coins,  ....  27 
Silver  coins,  ...  416 
Ratio  of  pure  metal, 


Jf-ff 


24! 
371  £ 


Gross 
weight. 

25.8 


June  28,  1834. 

Standard. 
.899225 

or 


Pure 
metal. 

23.2 
:  16.002 


January  18,  1837. 
Gross  Pure 

weight.    Standard,    metal. 

Gold  coins, 25.8  T95          23.22 

Silver  coins, 412^          T97  37i£ 

Ratio  of  pure  metal, i  :  15.998 


February  21,  1853. 
Gross  Pure 

weight.  Standard,  metal. 

Fractional  silver  coins,  384        T9<j*      345^ 
Trade-dollar,     .... 


February  12,  1873. 

Gross  Pure 

weight.  Standard,    metal. 

385-8f      rk        347-22 
420  &        378 


STATEMENT  C. 

Showing  the  coinage  of  gold  and  silver  at  the  mints  of  the  United 
States  by  periods,  together  with  the  total  production  from  the  mines 
of  the  country  since  1792. 

Silver 
to  the  value  of 

$36,275,07790 
42,966,776.60 
578,126,532.60 


Gold 
to  the  value  of 


1792-1833, $11,825,890.00 

1834-1852, 224,962,920.00 

1853-1892, 1,345,578,425.50 


1792-1892, $1,582,367,235.50  $657,368,387.10 

Production, $1,904,881,769.00       $1,073,172,000.00 


1792-1833,  

1834-1852, 

1853-1873,  

1853-1892,  

1878-1892,  

1873-1878  (Trade-dollars), 


Silver  Dollars. 

$1,439,517 
1,067,373 
5,524,328 

413,988,735 
35,965,924 


Fractional  Silver 
to  the  value  of 

134,835,560.90 
41,899,403.60 

122,647,525.60 


*  Except  the  three-cent  piece  (March  3,  1851),  which  was  f£  fine ;  weight  changed 
to  standard  March  3  1853. 
f  Equals  25  grams 


46 


ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


o  3 

a  w 

w  « 

g§ 

w  o 

2§ 
«  S 

sg 

«  5  s 

gsl 

^    ^    M 

<8S 
HSS 

P    n 


•,  a 
Si 

8  >< 

g 
« 
I 

K 

<1 

§ 
o 

§ 
I 


GOLD  COINAGE. 

DOLLARS. 

I 
:  : 

QUARTER- 
EAGLES. 

8888 

ssgss 

liii 

B8S 

8 

8 

fgS- 

g 

§ 

THREE 

DOLLARS. 

:    :    : 

: 

1 
:                   :      • 

:              :       :       : 

HALF- 
EAGLES. 

i£)  iO  O  iC  iC  O  C 

Islll 

i§ 

?f8f 

EAGLES. 

P 

•Illslli 

i 

:           \ 

'gggggss 

1 

: 

:          • 

1 

DOUBLE- 
EAGLES. 

: 

\ 

:    : 

i  i       i 

: 

!  i       1 

i 

i  :       i 

: 

: 

i      ! 

: 

i  1      i 

CALENDAR  YEARS. 

:   :          : 
:   :          : 

] 

I 

j 
j 

:           j 

i 

: 

:         j 

j 

j         1 

i         i 

:             : 

: 

1 

•   : 

:  :  :  :      • 

:       :       :  : 
III!! 

USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          47 


BBS 


-^  i— <  O 


^  o  o  co  o  **i*  i 

?5  TT  iC  '>O  CC  5  ' 


-co  cc_o_c^oib  r-  vo^  i-iio 


I^SIslli^Si" 


"^  *^  ^  "^ 


48 


ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


«<  O 

W-«J 
63 


O*J2iOil7CNCOiOC^C^COCOCOC^C^C'J^^C4COCO*O^ 
•<*!  CC  6^  O^  l"^  r— ^  C^l  if5_  &  CO  Cft  tO  f*4  QQ  ^1  (N  O>  O  W  4O  CD  O 

COCCCOCO^r-T 


8888S88S8g8888888888888gS888SS88 


irf  CS 

M 


I 


r-i  i^  (N  M  t><N  I-H        rH 


^ccc^co^ 


CO  T}<  1C  < 
- 1^  t^-  l^-  I 

OOOO  OO  C 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


49 


TABLE  II. 
COINAGE  OF  THE  MINTS  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  FROM  THEIR  ORGANIZATION,  BY  CALENDAR 
YEARS  AND  BY  DENOMINATION  OF  PIECES 

SILVER  COINAGE. 

THREE 

CENTS. 

:    :    :        :::::: 

•    •    i    i    •            :    :    :    ?    •        1   J 

•      ; 

:::.;: 

S| 

S 

F 

c- 

9 

§3 

ef 

8S8S  IS 

:   • 

i    1 

: 

lill  jl 

ill 

j 

1 

S 

oo  o 

88S8S8 

8 

8S8 

is 

SS8S 

s  i 

CO  '-O  i-O 

sag 

SiliSl 

1 

511 

;§ 

111! 

lj 

i 

• 

•3 

TWENTY 

CENTS. 

i  i 

j        j 

:    :    i    i 

'•   •   : 

:    : 

:   1 

:   : 

i 

j 

i   :       : 

I 

QUARTER- 
DOLLARS. 

S8 

oc 

'Si^ 

i  ss 

SSSSS8 

8 

SSfl! 

"<^ 

^oo—  .p 

:     |§ 

8ii^l§ 

I 

:     ^ 

8^SSS^ 

j 

HALF- 
DOLLARS. 

i 

8 

SSSSi 

888888SSS 

8S888SS88S8 

Illllllii 

iiI£S§ 

M.^, 

< 
I 

\\ 

j 

:  •  ;  ;  ;  ; 

:   i   : 

i  i  i  i  i 

: 

i   :   i   :   : 

j 

lj!|| 

!   : 

1 

CALENDAR  YEARS. 
TR 

DOLI 

i  i  j  i  !  i  i  !  i  i  i 

j 

:    : 

j 

!::::: 

:    :    : 

; 

: 

: 

:   :   :   :   : 

1 

'• 

j 

:   :   :   i   : 

j 

i 

• 

: 

:    :    :    :    : 

: 

j 

1  1  ill  I  ! 

^ 

oon 

111 

o6^c^c6<*io<br^Gc' 

SSSJSjSSSS00^ 

ANNAI^S  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


joSSSSSSS 


8388338888^888888838888833888 


8333838|8883g888888333838S883883 


w  « 

S3 


I 


38 

OiO 


888 


83S8S8383£8888S838883S338883 

||^I|si|||gi 


S8388SS833888888888883388388 

:""'  •' 


:2883gSS 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


5i 


-   X, 

£3 


8SS38S8888888S8 


Wo 


888S8S,8888888S8 

'' 


Hill  I 

•  yf »«      : 


'Trccof  to  i- 


t^t^Ooi  t>"iC  CO  ic  --O  iC 

t^-  oc  i/^  T—  -•  -c  —  *  ~  —  >^ 
oo  ^t-^S^tc  o  c~-  cc  -v  rf 

' 


IS 

Sf: 


o 


ANNAI^S  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


DIAGRAM  I. — Gold  and  Silver  Coinage  of  the  Mints  of  the 
United  States  (1834-1892). 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          53 


DIAGRAM  II.— Coining  Value  of  the  Gold  and  Silver  Produced 
from  the  Mines  of  the  United  States  (1853-1891; 


I 


^N»  P^* 


^*»  ^Nft  *^*»  ^ 


54 


ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


o     -* 
Q 


•  C".  ~t 
CO  CO 


:  ci"  50  «o  ,-TTH  co 


I  C»T-KO  ( 

I5SSS! 


*o 

o 


ooccT—  'Otoci^oc^ocot^r-  'Oico^H 

rH  g)  ?5  CO  CC  ^  Xl  O  LO  S  ^  CO  <M  OO  O  1C 


"o     T*-^ioi-4 


C<lCO'^f*OCOt>*OCO'^C^CiOCCC^L^ 

'''''' 


oo  •^•^.•<*ioo  ^ 

>H  r^co  ^co' 

o3  O  »  *  **  " 

•— »  rHrHCC^J1 


S  O         C»  iC  00 

' 


ig  co  aoe^  oo  jc 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.  55 


fe  w 

i  i  i  !  i  :  i  ;  i  1 

i 

leg 

I    MM! 

r    i    *    I    *    I    i    I    •    • 

-  -  ? 

'o       •    *   *   *    * 

.    r    ...*•••• 

W  *"  "** 

Q       '•:::: 

:   :    :::::::: 

ass 


a     *t» 
i— (r-t^H 


'o      i^TjT^i^of 


S  S  S  S" S  S3  a  ^SSSSSS^sSSgf 88 S S8"S5 S 


*  1  slj.ss  a  aJjAfe*g||**J  s  « ^ 

o      »o>  =  «otf,«^QO^o^^^r. 


.  T -' 

*  § i § 1 


ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


at 


fe><n 

is! 

9«K 


ll 


&  * 


t^^O^ 


:£ig^gg&gS§sfe§5i^Jj2S 

"r-Tco'ofcfof  r-T     <rf  i-Tc<f  c4*  c^f  co~irf  i-Ttd'odr^cc  ^ 

r-(  ^  rH         rH  1—1         rH 


^ 

S        S  00  2  ?J  1^  S  j£  2  (^  ~  ~  p.  "  ,'-'  I^  cv 

•S      eci:H?Jtbo3eooiC?-y5oo^'r4xt-i.o 
O         TH"c<fr-r     oo'i4'cri»'ol1»4'efi-4 


§  S  00  C5  C-l 


«  Ss 


Tr-^       00"r4(N"^<N1TH'cir4'       VO  t>  COV-Tc 


•^>^.-^^iTj*'rhTyti:^itr~  ;*~  ;^  ."riHiOu^i.^cc^C^C^O- 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 


57 


fc  5  . 


11 


! 


'*<  c 
ceo 


—  -- 

_r^  co 

s 


Mecsouooioi^i.caicoeoi.ocoQcoCTiTj'Q 

t  C".  I ^  X  T  I  'J'    7  I  i  7  I  •-  i ~  Ct  TS  X  i.t  i*  u^  T-^  G 
?  ^S  C<1  »D  O  S-.  CC  C>4  31  t^  CO  i-H  CO  1-1  O5  00  -^  5 


?   £-£«"  .  - ... .  -i  -  -  -.*  .-*xw»  -  -  .• 

«   S5^ 


ANNALS  OF  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


TABLE  V. 

AVERAGE   ANNUAL   PRODUCTION  OF  GOLD  AND  SILVER  IN  THE 
WORLD  BY  PERIODS  FROM  1492  to  1880. 

From  Soetbeer,  as  quoted  in  Laughlirfs  "History  of  Bimetallism  in 
the  United  States,"  pp.  217-219. 


SILVER. 

GOLD. 

SILVER. 

GOLD. 

1493—1520.. 

82,115,000 

$4,045,500 

1761—1780... 

$29,383,250 

$14,441,750 

1521—1544.. 

4,059,000 

4,994,000 

1781—1800. 

39,557,750 

12,408,500 

1545—1560.. 

14,022,000 

5,935,400 

1801-1810. 

40,236,750 

12,400,000 

1561—1580.. 

13,477,500 

4,770,750 

1811-1820. 

2  .',334,750 

7,983,000 

1581—1600.. 

18,850,500 

5,147,500 

1821—1830. 

20,725,250 

9,915,750 

1601—1620.. 

19,030,500 

5.942,750 

1831—1840. 

26,840,250 

14,151,500 

1621—1640  . 

17,712,000 

5,789,250 

1841—1850. 

35,118,750 

38,194,250 

1641—1660.. 

16,483,500 

6,117,000 

1851—  1855. 

39,875,000 

137,775,000 

1661—1680.. 

15,165,000 

6,458,750 

1856—1860. 

40,725,000 

143,725,000 

1681—1700.. 

15,385,500 

7,508,500 

1861—1865. 

49,550,000 

129,125,000 

1701—1720.. 

16,002,000 

8,»42.000 

1866—1870. 

60,250,000 

133,850,000 

1721-1740.. 

19,404,000 

13,308,250,. 

88,625,000 

119,050,000 

1741—1760.. 

23,991,500 

17,165,500 

1576-lbSO.:. 

.^12,500,000 

119,975,000 

TJHI7ERSIT7 


DIAGRAM  IV.— Commercial  Rati 


/f 


It,.* 

(7 


Silver  to  Gold  each  year  since  1687. 


'r 


17 


/I 


S^^;^>^^^ 


USE  OF  SILVER  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.          59 


DIAGRAM  III.— Annual  Production  of  Gold  and  Silver  in  the 
World  (coining  value),  for  the  calendar  years  1873-1891. 

$180,040.100  f 

/ 


6o 


ANNALS  OP  THE  AMERICAN  ACADEMY. 


DIAGRAM  V. — Value  of  an  Ounce  of  fine  Silver  at 
average  quotation  (1833-1892). 


Coining  Value 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
STAMPED  BELOW 


AN     INITIAL     FINE     OF     25     CENTS 

WILL  BE  ASSESSED  FOR  FAILURE  TO  RETURN 
THIS  BOOK  ON  THE  DATE  DUE.  THE  PENALTY 
WILL  INCREASE  TO  SO  CENTS  ON  THE  FOURTH 
DAY  AND  TO  $1.OO  ON  THE  SEVENTH  DAY 
OVERDUE. 


APR    15   1933 


12  1959 


SEP  2  6  196Z 


REC'D  LD 

OCT6    1362 


Jt' 
REC'D  L 


OCT21196Z 


REC'D  LD 

OCT24'63-8PM 


V 

PC'D  LD 

25'65-12M 


0  6  2009 


LD  21-50m-l,'33 


YC  241 


